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Making  Good  in  the  Ministry 


Books  by 
PROF,  j9,  T.  ROBERTSON 

Critical  Notes  to  Broadus'  Harmony  of  the  Gospels, 

Eighth  Edition. 
Life    and   Letters  of   John   A.    Broadus.      Popular 

Edition. 
Teaching    of   Jesus    Concerning   God    the    Father. 

Teaching  of  Jesus  Series. 
The  Student's  Chronological  New  Testament. 
Syllabus  for  New  Testament  Study.     Fourth  Edition. 
Keywords  in  the  Teaching  of  Jesus. 
Epochs  in  the  Life  of  Jesus.     Popular  Edition. 
A  Short  Grammar   of  the  Greek  New  Testament. 

Fourth  Edition. 
Epochs  in  the  Life  of  Paul.     Popular  Edition. 
Commentary    on    Matthew.      Bible   for  Home   and 

School. 
John  the  Loyal :    A  Study  of  the  Ministry  of  John 

the  Baptist.     Popular  Edition. 
The   Glory  of  the   Ministry:    Paul's  Exultation  in 

Preaching.     Third  Edition. 
A  Grammar  of  the  Greek  New  Testament  in  the 

Light  of  Historical  Research.     Second  Edition. 
Practical  and  Social  Aspects  of  Christianity :    The 

Wisdom  of  James.     Second  Edition. 
Studies  in  the  New  Testament.     Many  Editions, 
The  Divinity  of  Christ  in  the  Gospel  of  John.    Second 

Edition. 
Paul's  Joy  in  Christ  s  Studies  in  Philippians. 
The    Pharisees  and   Jesus.     The  Stone    (Princeton) 

Lectures  for  19 15-16.     In  press. 
Young  America,  or  Patriotic  Citizenship.     In  press. 
Making  Good  in  the  Ministry :    A  Sketch  of  John 

Mark. 


Making  Good  in  fte 
Ministry 

A  Sketch  of  John  Mark 


By 

PROF.  A.  T.'ROBERTSON,  M.A.,  D.D.,  LL.D. 

Professor  of  New  Testament  Interpretation, 

Southern  Baptist  Theological  Seminary, 

Louisville,  Ky. 


SEP  21   1918 


US' 


«*  For  he  is  useful  to  me  for  ministering  " 


New  York  Chicago 

Fleming  H.  Revell  Company 

London  and  Edinburgh 


Copyright,  191 8,  by 
FLEMING  H.  REVELL  COMPANY 


New  York:  158  Fifth  Avenue 
Chicago:  17  North  Wabash  Ave. 
London :  2 1  Paternoster  Square 
Edinburgh :      75     Princes     Street 


To 
MY    STUDENTS 


Preface 

WITH  May,  1918,  I  complete  thirty 
years  as  a  teacher  of  young  preach- 
ers. About  four  thousand  during 
this  period  have  been  my  pupils  besides  hun- 
dreds of  young  women.  They  are  scattered 
all  over  the  world  as  workers  for  Christ  and 
some  have  gone  on  before.  My  own  life  will 
count  for  much  or  little  in  proportion  as 
these  men  and  women  do  well  the  work  that 
God  has  placed  in  their  hands.  I  love  them 
with  my  whole  heart  and  this,  my  twentieth 
book,  alas,  deals  directly  with  the  failure  or 
success  of  one's  life-work  as  illustrated  by 
John  Mark.  My  very  heart  has  gone  into 
this  book  and  with  it  a  message  to  all 
workers  for  Christ,  young  and  old,  all  over 
the  world  of  whatever  creed.  John  Mark  has 
a  message  for  us  all.  It  is  not  easy  to-day 
to  make  a  success  of  one's  ministry.  It 
never  was  easy.  It  never  will  be  easy. 
Ministerial  fidelity  makes  success  possible. 
There  is  something  sweeter  than  success.     It 

is  to  deserve  it. 

A.  T.  R. 

Louisville^  Ky» 

1 


Contents 


I.  The  Home  Atmosphere 

II.  The  Call  of  Opportunity 

III.  Taking  a  Humble  Place 

IV.  Flickering  in  a  Crisis  . 

V.  Thrown  Out  of  Work 

VI.  Turned  Down  by  Paul 

VII.  Given  a  New  Chance  by  Barnabas 

VIII.  Peter's  Son  and  Interpreter 

IX.  Mark's  Wondrous  Gospel    . 

X.  Winning  Paul's  Praise 


II 

31 

43 

53 

69 

83 

95 

109 

127 

155 


I 

THE  HOME  ATMOSPHERE 

^^He  came  to  the  house  of  Mary  the  mother  of  John 
whose  surname  was  Mark ;  where  many  were 
gathered  together  and  were  praying.^* 

— Acts  12;  12. 


THE  HOME  ATMOSPHERE 

I.    The  Home  that  Makes  Preachers. 

IT  is  in  the  home  that,  as  a  rule,  preach- 
ers are  made  or  unmade.  Instance 
Scotland  where  in  the  palace  of  the 
laird  or  in  the  thatch-roofed  cottage  of  the 
cottar  the  mother  wishes  no  higher  crown  for 
her  boy  than  that  he  be  "  a  good  minister  of 
Christ  Jesus'*  and  live  to  "speak  a  gude 
word  for  Jesus."  In  many  so-called  Christian 
homes  to-day  it  would  be  considered  a  posi- 
tive misfortune  if  the  sons  heeded  the  call  of 
God  to  become  preacher,  missionary,  or 
Y.  M.  C.  A.  worker  or  if  the  girls  likewise 
responded  to  the  voice  of  duty  which  is 
the  voice  of  God.  It  must  be  confessed  that 
some  homes  are  a  positive  hindrance  to  the 
young  lives  that  throb  in  response  to  the 
clamoring  calls  of  to-day,  who,  like  Joan  of 
Arc,  hear  voices  calling  them  out  and  on  to 
China,  to  India,  to  Brazil.  The  Student 
13 


14     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

Volunteer  Movement  has  brought  definite 
decision  to  thousands  who  had  hitherto 
dodged  the  great  question  of  a  life  calling 
and  had  drifted  on  with  smothered  conscience. 
The  Y.  M.  C.  A.  and  Y.  W.  C.  A.  summer 
conferences  have  likewise  proved  to  be  the 
hour  of  destiny  for  many  more  who  had  not 
found  their  Bethel  at  home,  in  church,  or  in 
college.  But  the  home  has  the  first  chance 
at  the  boy.  He  can  never  quite  get  over 
the  nesting-place  and  ought  not  to  have 
to  forget  it.  The  difficulty  in  finding  work- 
ers for  various  forms  of  Christian  activity 
to-day  is  at  bottom  the  problem  of  the 
home. 

2.     A  City  Home. 

John  Mark  lived  in  the  city  and  not  in  the 
country.  To-day  nearly  all  the  recruits  for 
active  Christian  service  come  from  the  coun- 
try homes.  Young  men  in  the  city  can  hear 
the  call  of  country,  but  not  so  readily  the  call 
of  God.  City  youths  have  to  respond  under 
a  universal  draft  law,  but  they  showed  up 
well  under  the  volunteer  system  in  compari- 
son with  the  country  young  men.  But  the 
din  of  the  city  drowns  the  still  small  voice  of 


THE  HOME  ATMOSPHEEE  15 

God.  The  clamor  of  the  market  crowds  out 
the  appeal  of  the  Spirit.  The  clink  of  gold 
clutches  at  the  heart  that  ought  to  be  sensi- 
tive to  the  presence  of  the  Man  Christ  Jesus. 
So  we  look  to  the  hills  for  the  preachers,  for 
nature  there  allows  some  opportunity  for 
the  things  of  the  spirit  to  have  a  hearing. 
At  least  it  did  before  the  telephone,  the 
automobile,  the  interurban  car,  and  the 
parcel  post  came  to  the  country.  What 
these  material  comforts  will  yet  do  to  the 
spiritual  life  in  the  country  home  and  the 
country  church  remains  to  be  seen.  Already 
the  country  church  is  in  dire  peril,  we  are 
told. 

But  Christ  can  dwell  in  hearts  that  live  in 
city  homes  and  young  preachers  can  come 
out  of  this  city  atmosphere.  In  the  first  cen- 
tury A.  D.  it  was,  as  a  rule,  dangerous  to  live 
in  the  country.  People  who  toiled  in  the 
country  lived  in  villages  and  towns  as  in 
China  now.  The  city  ruled  the  ancient 
world  as  it  is  coming  to  do  in  America.  We 
must  not  admit  that  city  homes  have  no  ob- 
ligations to  God  in  the  matter  of  ministerial 
supply.  The  balance  of  population  will  soon 
be  in  favor  of  the  city  in  the  United  States. 


16     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

It  is  hard  to  turn  the  heart  to  the  service  of 
Christ  in  an  atmosphere  dominated  by  the 
moving  picture  shows  or  by  the  mad  rush 
for  money,  place,  or  power.  But  Christ  won 
a  hearing  even  in  Jerusalem,  held,  as  it  was, 
in  the  grip  of  tradition,  where  scribe  and 
priest  shut  the  door  in  the  face  of  those  who 
wished  to  learn  and  threw  away  the  key  to 
knowledge.  But  they  crucified  Christ  in  the 
end.  The  first  thing  to  note  about  John 
Mark  is  that  he  lived  in  the  city. 

3.    A  Home  of  Some  Wealth. 

The  city,  alas,  has  homes  and  homes.  The 
tenement  house  is  almost  a  hell  unless  Christ 
has  come  into  the  heart  of  the  owner  and 
He  makes  it  a  model  tenement  hall.  Even 
the  palatial  apartment  houses  are  not  very 
homelike  and  the  great  hotels  have  no  home 
atmosphere  at  all.  Better  far  a  cottage  with 
Christ  than  a  palace  without  Him,  grand  and 
cheerless  and  chill.  But  Christ  will  enter 
the  palace  if  the  owner  gives  Him  the  key 
to  his  heart  and  makes  room  for  Him  there, 
Mary's  house  was  a  home  of  wealth.  Mark 
was  a  cousin^  of  Barnabas  (Col.  4 :  10).    Bar- 

^  So  dveipto^  is  to  be  rendered,  not  "  sister's  son." 


THE  HOME  ATMOSPHEBE  17 

nabas  was  a  man  of  means  and  of  great  gen- 
erosity (Acts  4:36f.).     As  he  was  a  Levite 
and  from  Cyprus,  the  family  of  Mark  prob- 
ably came  from  that  island.     The  house  of 
Mary  had  a  gate  and  a  passageway  leading 
to  the  inner  court,  *'  the  door  of  the  gate,"  ^ 
somewhat  like  a  Scotch  "  close."     The  door 
was  next  to  the  street  (Luke  13  :  25).     There 
was  a  gateway  or  passageway  to  the  house 
of  Simon  the  Tanner  in  Joppa  (Acts  10: 17). 
In  New  Orleans  to-day  the  old  French  houses 
have  an  inner  court  which  is  entered  by  an 
outside  gate.     The  house  of  Mary  was  large 
enough  for  a  considerable  company,  "  many  " 
(Acts  12  :  12),  to  be  gathered.     The  presence 
of  the  slave-girl  or  doorkeeper  is  another  in- 
dication of  a  well-to-do  home  as  in  the  house 
of  Caiaphas  (John  18  :  16).     "  Mary's  house," 
therefore,  had  been  a  place  of  importance  in 
the  social  life  of  Jerusalem  before  she  became 
a  Christian.     She  then  made  it  a  center  of 
Christian  activity  as  Martha  and  Mary  had 
made  their  Bethany  home,  likewise  a  home 
of  ease  and  some  affluence,  the  home  of  Jesus 

^Acts  12:  13  TTjv  dopav  TOO  7:uXu)vo<^,  In  Matthew 
26:71  Tov  TcoXwva  is  "the  porch."  The  fact  of  a 
"  porch  "  shows  that  it  was  a  house  of  some  size. 


18     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

(Luke  lo :  38-42).  There  was  thus  "  a  church 
in  Mary^s  house  "  in  Jerusalem  as  in  that  of 
Prisca  and  Aquila  in  Rome  (Rom.  16 :  5)  and 
of  Philemon  (Philemon  2)  and  of  Nymphas 
in  Colossae  (Col.  4:15).  The  house  was  spa- 
cious and  gave  the  Christians  a  place  to  meet 
when  they  could  no  longer  assemble  in  temple 
or  synagogue  in  Jerusalem  as  was  now  the 
case.  Peter  himself  was  just  out  of  prison 
and  fear  gripped  again  the  community  of 
believers  in  the  city.  It  is  thought  by  some 
that  "  the  upper  room "  (Acts  1:13)  where 
the  disciples  met  for  prayer  when  they  were 
waiting  for  the  promise  of  the  Father  was 
in  Mary's  house.  Some  even  hold^  that  it 
was  in  Mary's  house  that  Jesus  observed  the 
last  passover  meal  and  instituted  the  supper 
(Mark  14:12-25).  But  it  is  at  least  clear 
that  John  Mark  lived  in  a  home  of  compara- 
tive ease  and  of  good  social  standing. 

4.     A  Home  Where  Christ  is  King. 

This  is  what  matters  most.  Wealth,  cul- 
ture, social  leadership,  power,  all  should  be 
laid  at  the  feet  of  Jesus.     Mary  had  taken 

'  Cf.  Edersheim,  "  Life  and  Times  of  Jesus  the  Mes- 
siah," Vol.  II,  p.  485. 


THE  HOME  ATMOSPHEEE  19 

her  stand  uncompromisingly  for  Christ  her 
Lord.  She  had  thus  broken  away  from  the 
strong  Jewish  environment  of  her  Levite 
kinspeople.  She  was  helped,  to  be  sure,  by 
Barnabas,  her  kinsman,  and,  being  probably 
a  Hellenistic  Jew,  she  was  not  quite  so  closed 
to  new  ideas  as  the  average  Palestinian  Jew. 
The  tyranny  of  one's  social  class  is  merciless, 
as  many  a  woman  discovers  who  cuts  through 
it  all  and  comes  out  into  actual  and  active 
service  for  Christ.  She  is  termed  peculiar 
and  unfashionable  and  runs  the  risk  of  the 
social  taboo.  But  Mary  threw  her  beautiful 
home  wide  open  to  Christ  instead  of  to  the 
world.  There  are  such  homes  to-day  in  our 
modern  cities,  homes  of  great  wealth,  the 
highest  culture,  the  truest  aristocracy,  the 
most  genuine  piety.  Such  a  home  is  not 
made  without  a  fight  against  worldliness 
with  all  its  insidious  allurements.  Jesus  as- 
tonished the  disciples  exceedingly  by  saying : 
**  It  is  easier  for  a  camel  to  go  through  a 
needle's  eye,  than  for  a  rich  man  to  enter  the 
Kingdom  of  God"  (Mark  10:25).  "Then 
who  can  be  saved  ?  "  they  asked,  feeling  that 
it  was  easier  for  the  rich  than  for  the  poor. 
Jesus  meant  to  state  a  natural  impossibility : 


20     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

"With  men  it  is  impossible,  but  not  with 
God:  for  all  things  are  possible  with  God" 
(Mark  10:27).  Thank  God  both  rich  and 
poor  can  enter  the  Kingdom  of  God  and  on 
precisely  the  same  terms,  full  surrender  and 
simple  trust.  Service  flags  and  Red  Cross 
flags  hang  in  the  windows  of  many  homes 
to-day  because  of  loyalty  to  our  country. 
Christ  is  King.  Let  Him  be  Lord  of  our 
homes  and  of  all  the  home  life,  openly  and 
aboveboard,  so  that  all  the  world  may  know 
where  our  loyalty  lies. 

5.     The  Widowed  Mother. 

"  Evidently  a  widow,"  Ramsay  *  says,  since 
there  is  no  mention  of  the  husband  and 
father  and  since  it  is  "  the  house  of  Mary." 
She  was  "another  Mary,  another  of  those 
women  whose  praise  was  in  the  early 
church."  ^  The  other  "  Marys "  were  the 
mother  of  Jesus,  the  wife  of  Cleopas,  the 
mother  of  James  and  Joses,  Mary  Magdalene, 
and  Mary  of  Bethany.  The  name  was  com- 
mon with  the  Jews  because  of  Miriam,  the 

'  "  Pictures  of  the  Apostolic  Church,"  19 10,  p.  109. 
^  Rackham,   "  The    Acts    of   the    Apostles,"    1 909, 
p.  178. 


THE  HOME  ATMOSPHERE  21 

sister  of  Moses.  Luke  pictures  this  Mary 
from  the  standpoint  of  the  later  development 
as  **  the  mother  of  John  whose  surname  was 
Mark.*'  She  came  to  live  in  the  reflected 
glory  of  her  noble  son  after  he  rose  to  use- 
fulness and  fame.  This  was  as  she  wished 
it  to  be,  as  any  true  mother  would  have  it. 
But  at  this  stage  of  the  history  Mark  was 
simply  Mary's  son  with  his  future  before  him 
with  all  its  problems,  hopes,  and  fears.  Mary 
is  the  queen  of  this  home  and  her  spirit 
reigned  within  its  walls.  She  created  the 
atmosphere  which  all  breathed  who  entered 
her  home.  It  was  the  aroma  of  a  lofty  soul 
who  lived  with  Christ  and  loved  to  bless  all 
around  her  with  the  grace  and  charm  of  her 
rich  character.  Mary  was  a  leader  in  the 
church  by  force  of  Christian  character  and 
the  dynamic  of  love  that  made  her  unwilling 
to  be  a  negative  quantity  in  the  life  of  the 
Jerusalem  church.  She  had  initiative  and 
resource  and  courage.  She  was  not  afraid 
to  open  her  home  to  the  disciples  at  the  very 
time  when  their  leader,  Simon  Peter,  was  in 
prison  and  when  James,  the  brother  of  John, 
had  been  beheaded  by  Herod  Agrippa  to 
please  the  Jews  (Acts  12:1  f.).     Her  courage 


22     MAKING  G(X)D  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

was  contagious,  as  we  can  easily  see,  and 
steadied  some  of  the  wavering  ones. 

6.    The  Gathering  for  Prayer. 

Prayer  had  been  going  on  without  ceas- 
ing since  the  arrest  of  Peter  (Acts  12:5). 
Agrippa  was  simply  waiting  till  the  passover 
feast  was  over  and  the  crowd  was  gone  to 
have  Peter  put  to  death,  strangely  like  the 
plan  of  the  Sanhedrin  about  Jesus  before 
Judas  came  to  the  rescue  (Luke  22  : 6).  The 
disciples  knew  the  peril  of  Peter  with  the  fate 
of  James  before  their  very  eyes.  Prison 
doors  had  opened  before  for  Peter  and  John 
(Acts  5:19)  and  once  before  they  had  prayed 
to  God  for  boldness  to  defy  the  ecclesiastical 
authorities  and  God  had  heard  their  cry 
(Acts  4:23-31).  But  this  time  it  was  the 
hand  of  the  state  that  was  stretched  forth 
against  them  and  the  Christians,  though  now 
many  thousands  strong  in  Jerusalem,  were 
still  in  a  great  minority.  They  seemed  to 
have  prayed  night  and  day.^  The  exigency 
was  great.     Perhaps  the  disciples  came  and 

^  Luke's  words  in  12:5  (^/^revaJ?  yivofxivrj)  seem  to 
mean  that,  though  **  earnestly  "  is  the  translation.  Luke 
uses  i^reviffzepov  of  the  prayer  of  Christ  in  the  Garden 
of  Gethsemane  (Luke  22  :  44). 


THE  HOME  ATMOSPHERE  23 

went,  but  the  praying  went  on.  The  church's 
leaders  seem  to  have  been  absent  this  night, 
for  **  James  and  the  brethren  "  (12  :  17)  had  a 
message  sent  them.  Whether  it  just  hap- 
pened so  or  the  leaders  were  assembled  else- 
where for  caution  we  do  not  know.  But  a 
great  crowd  (probably  mostly  Hellenistic 
Christians)  were  on  hand  this  night.  "  The 
supplication  of  a  righteous  man  availeth  much 
in  its  working"  (Jas.  5  :  16).  In  prayer  these 
disciples  turned  "  to  that  alliance  which  is 
indeed  invincible "  (Chrysostom,  Horn,  26). 
*'  It  is  an  early  instance  of  the  Christian 
custom  of  spending  the  whole  night  in  watch- 
ing and  prayer"  (Rackham,  *'  Commentary," 
p.  178).  Jesus  had  set  the  example.  Paul 
held  an  all  night  service  at  Troas  (Acts  20 :  7- 
12).  And  there  was  real  praying  going  on, 
we  may  be  sure,  prayer  for  the  deliverance  of 
Simon  Peter  from  prison,  prayer  for  this 
specific  blessing. 

7.    Peter's  Visit. 

Here  was  the  hand  of  God  beyond  a  doubt. 
On  the  same  night  on  which  Agrippa  had 
planned  to  bring  Peter  forth  and  kill  him  to 
add  to  the  pleasure  of  the  Jews  (12:3,  6)  God 


24     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

interposed  and  answered  the  prayer  of  the 
church  for  Peter  (12  :  5)  by  sending  an  angel 
or  messenger/  for  the  word  is  used  both  ways. 
But  there  is  no  way  to  get  rid  of  the  super- 
natural interposition  of  God  in  direct  answer 
to  the  prayers  of  the  disciples.  It  is  a  graphic 
story,  the  dazed  stupor  of  Peter  as  he  is  led 
out,  freed  from  his  chains,  past  the  first  guard 
and  then  the  second,  through  the  iron  gate 
that  opened  of  its  own  accord,  and  out  on  the 
street  at  last,  free.  The  angel  was  gone  and 
Peter  **  came  to  himself  '*  ^  and  recognized  the 
hand  of  God  and  his  own  danger.  God  had 
delivered  him  "  out  of  the  hand  of  Herod,  and 
from  all  the  expectations  of  the  people  of  the 
Jews"  (12  :  11),  but  Peter  had  no  notion  of 
sitting  still  and  waiting  till  Herod  arrested 
him  again,  for  he  was  bound  to  learn  of  his 
escape  as  he  did.  So  he  "  considered  "  ^  the 
thing  and  came  to  the  house  of  Mary.  It  was 
probably  after  3  A.  M.  (Furneaux,  "Acts," 
p.  182),  but  he  was,  like  the  other  disciples, 
a  frequent  visitor  at  this  hospitable  home  and 

^  ayyeXoi;  Kopioo  (l  2  :  7). 

"^  h  iauT(p  y£v6iJ.svo<s  (12:  ii),  like  Luke's  phrase 
about  the  Prodigal  Son  ei^  iaurou  IXdwv  (Luke  15:17). 

^  (Tuvid6v  (cf.  14:6),  looking  at  it  together  or  as  a 
whole. 


THE  HOME  ATMOSPHEBB  25 

he  was  sure  of  a  welcome  and  of  refuge  for 
the  moment.  Possibly  '*  some  special  tie  ex- 
isted between  him  and  this  family"  (Fur- 
neaux,  ibid).  He  calls  Mark  **  his  son " 
(i  Pet.  5  :  13),  and  he  may  have  been  the 
means  of  winning  the  young  man  to  Christ. 
The  disciples  could  hear  his  knocking  and 
the  maid  ^  went  to  answer  ^  the  knock  at  this 
strange  hour  of  the  night,  though  all  were 
awake  and  at  prayer.  Rhoda  (Rose)  knew 
Peter's  voice,  because  he  was  a  frequent 
guest  at  the  house,  and  knew  that  the  com- 
pany was  keeping  all  night  vigil  for  his  re- 
lease. Her  conduct  is  drawn  to  the  life  as, 
through  excess  of  joy,  she  left  Peter  standing 
on  the  outside  and  still  in  peril  while  she  ran 
back  and  told  the  anxious  group  that  Peter 
stood  there  before  the  gate  (12  :  14).  It  was 
a  moment  when  overwrought  nerves  snap. 
When  Jesus  appeared  to  the  disciples  in  the 
upper  room  on  the  night  of  the  Resurrection 
Day,  they  disbelieved  for  joy  (Luke  24  :  41). 

^nai8i(jKr}.  Portress  or  slave-girl.  **  Domestic  slaves 
were  at  that  time  treated  generally  as  humble  members  of 
the  family  in  pagan,  much  more  in  Christian,  house- 
holds "  (Ramsay,  **  Pictures  of  the  Apostolic  Church," 
p.  109). 

Suggests  listening  before  opening. 


26     MAKING  GOOD  m  THE  MINISTRY 

Human  nature  at  high  tension  does  not  work 
by  rule.  So  now,  with  the  answer  to  their 
prayer  at  the  gate,  they  turn  on  the  poor  girl 
and  say,  **Thou  art  mad.'*  Her  confident 
reiteration  brought  the  interpretation  that  it 
was  *'  his  angel "  (12  :  15),  whether  his  ghost 
or  his  guardian  angel,  as  some  held  to  be 
true,  is  not  clear.  But  Peter  (the  ghost!) 
kept  on  knocking  ^  till  finally  the  whole  com- 
pany (*'  they  ")  hurried  down  the  courtyard, 
as  a  protection  to  each  other,  and  bravely 
opened  the  door  and  faced  Simon  Peter  him- 
self to  their  utter  amazement.  Their  prayer 
was  answered  as  they  had  really  expected  it 
to  be,  but  it  was  all  so  sudden  and  it  was  too 
good  to  be  true.  Our  faith  is  weak  at  best 
and  has  its  own  little  rules  for  the  Lord  to 
work  by.  Peter,  almost  in  terror,  beckoned 
to  the  excited  throng  to  be  still,  told  his  story, 
bade  them  tell  "James  and  the  brethren," 
and  "  went  to  another  place"  (12  :  17)  before 
he  could  be  found  by  Herod  Agrippa.  He 
may  have  gone  on  to  Antioch  or  to  Rome. 
James,  the  Lord's  brother,  is  already  the 
leader  in  Jerusalem. 

^  iTrifievev   npobo)v   (12:15).       Imperfect    tense   and 
supplementary  participle. 


THE  HOME  ATMOSPHEEE  27 

8.    And  Young  John  Mark. 

He  was  an  interested  spectator  of  the 
events  of  this  night.  Ramsay^  thinks  that 
Rhoda  told  Luke  this  vivid  story,  for  she 
alone  knew  all  the  details.  Perhaps  so,  but 
John  Mark  could  have  also  told  Luke.^ 
There  was  evidently  much  talk  after  Peter 
was  gone  and  all  the  items  were  rehearsed, 
one  by  one.  We  do  not  know  the  age 
of  John  Mark  at  this  time,  but  he  was 
probably  in  the  early  twenties.  Some  think 
he  was  the  man  "bearing  a  pitcher  of 
water"  (Luke  22:10)  who  was  to  guide 
Peter  and  John  to  the  house  for  the  pass- 
over  meal :  "  Follow  him  into  the  house 
whereinto  he  goeth."  He  is  also  held  by 
some  to  be  the  "  certain  young  man  "  of  Mark 
I4:5if.  who  followed  Jesus  into  the  Gar- 
den of  Gethsemane  and  fled  naked  when  the 
officers  tried  to  arrest  him.  Papias,  however, 
is  quoted  by  Eusebius  as  saying  of  Mark  that 
"he  neither  heard  the  Lord  nor  followed 
him."  But  almost  certainly  he  was  a  Chris- 
tian by  the  time  of  this  incident  in  Acts  12. 

*  "  Pictures  of  the  Apostolic  Church,"  p.  no. 
^  So  Knowling,  **  Expositor's  Greek  Testament,  Acts," 
p.  276. 


28     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

Holdsworth  ^  thinks  that  Mark  was  one  of  the 
six  brethren  that  accompanied  Peter  from 
Joppa  to  Caesarea  (Acts  lo  :  23).  "  Eusebius 
tells  that  St.  Mark  was  sent  to  Egypt  in  the  first 
year  of  the  Emperor  Claudius,  which  would 
be  in  A.  D.  41,  and  both  Eusebius  and  Jerome 
tell  us  that  he  took  his  Gospel  with  him.  St. 
Chrysostom  tells  us  that  he  wrote  his  Gospel 
in  Egypt."  HoldsWorth  is  here  arguing  for 
the  view  that  Mark  wrote  three  editions  of  his 
Gospel,  one  in  Caesarea  for  the  household  of 
Cornelius  (cf.  Acts  10  :  34-43,  where  the  same 
broad  outline  is  given  as  in  Mark^s  Gospel), 
one  in  Egypt,  and  one  in  Rome  (our  Mark). 
This  is  an  interesting  hypothesis,  but  it  can- 
not be  called  a  fact.  We  are  only  concerned 
with  it  here  for  the  light  that  it  throws  on  the 
activities  of  John  Mark  at  this  period.  In 
that  case  we  should  think  0I  him  as  at  least 
thirty.  It  is  quite  possible  that  he  had  al- 
ready been  Peter's  interpreter  in  his  work  at 
Joppa  and  Caesarea.  If  so,  this  bond  makes 
it  plainer  still  why  he  went  at  once  to  Mary's 


'"Gospel  Origins,"  191 3,  p.  115.  Ramsay  ("St. 
Paul  the  Traveller  and  Roman  Citizen,**  p.  51)  makes 
the  persecution  of  James  and  Peter  by  Herod  Agrippa  in 
the  early  part  of  a.  d.  44. 


THE  HOME  ATMOSPHERE  29 

house.     But,  at  any  rate,  this  youth  is  already 
in  touch  with  the  leaders  of  the  Jerusalem 
church.     He  is  kin  to  Barnabas,  is  a  protege 
of  Simon  Peter,  and  in  his  mother's  circle  of 
friends,  who  flock  to  her  home  as  a  sort  of 
Christian  salon^  he  comes  to  know  the  chief 
spirits  of  the  time.     It  is  impossible  to  over- 
estimate the  influence  for  good  of  the  presence 
in  the  home  of  the  noble  men  and  women 
whom  the  children  there  meet.     Gladstone 
brought  the  great  souls  of  his  day  to  Ha- 
warden   Casde  so  that  his   children  might 
come  in  touch  with  them.     John  Mark  had 
this  influence  on  his  early  life  and  it  left  its 
impress  upon  him.     Like  Saul  (Paul)  he  had 
both  a  Jewish  and  a  Roman  name.     There  is 
no  doubt  at  all  that  this  "John  Mark"  of 
Acts  12  :  12  is  the  **  John''  of  13  :  5,  13  and 
the  "Mark"  of  i  Peter  5  :  13  and  Colossians 
4:10;  2  Timothy  4:11.     It  is  possible  that 
Mark  may  have  been  a  regular  "  synagogue- 
minister,"  ^  like  the  man  in  Luke  4  :  20,  before 
his  conversion,  though  the  same  word  in  Acts 
13:5  used  of  Mark  may  have  a  more  general 
application.     If  this  were  true,  it  would  indi- 
cate that  Mark  was  a  man  familiar  with  re- 
^  Technical  use  of  uTcrjpiTrjf, 


30     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

ligious  work,  with  the  rolls  of  Scripture,  and 
something  of  a  practical  linguist  as  we  know 
that  he  was  later.  He  knew  well  both  the 
Aramaic  and  the  current  Greek  (Koine)  and 
spoke  both  fluently  so  that  he  could  act  as 
interpreter  or  dragoman  for  a  speaker  like 
Peter.  We  do  not  know  that  he  had  as  yet 
seriously  considered  becoming  a  preacher 
like  Peter  or  Barnabas,  but  the  question  must 
have  been  forced  upon  his  attention  in  this 
atmosphere.  Who  can  tell  what  were  his 
mother's  prayers  about  her  son  ?  Who  can 
tell  what  thoughts  throb  in  a  young  man's 
mind  and  heart?  Perhaps  Barnabas  and 
Peter  had  already  asked  Mark  what  his  life- 
choice  would  be.  Was  God  calling  him  into 
the  ministry  for  Jesus  ?  If  that  happens  to  a 
man,  it  usually  occurs  to  others  as  well  as  to 
the  man  himself. 


II 

THE  CALL  OF  OPPORTUNITY 


•'  Taking  with  them  John  whose  surname-was  Mark" 

— Acts  12:  25. 


II 

THE  CALL  OF  OPPORTUNITY 

WE  do  not  always  know  when  oppor- 
tunity knocks  at  our  door.  Many 
of  the  great  decisions  of  life  are 
made  without  our  meaning  to  make  them. 
We  take  a  step  and  then  another  and  we  are 
off  upon  the  great  adventure  of  life. 

I.    An  Incidental  Trip. 

It  is  clear  that  Mark  went  along  without 
meaning  as  yet  to  commit  himself  on  the 
great  question  of  his  life-calling.  "Barna- 
bas and  Saul  returned  from  Jerusalem,  when 
they  had  fulfilled  their  ministration,  taking 
with  ^  them  John  whose  surname  was  Mark" 

^  (Tuv7:apaXaj36vT£^.  Taking  along  together  with  (two 
prepositions).  This  very  word  with  both  prepositions 
occurs  again  in  connection  with  Mark  in  Acts  15:37^' 
Paul  uses  it  also  (Gal.  2:1)  about  taking  Titus  with 
him  to  Jerusalem.  The  word  shows  that  Mark  was  "an 
unofficial  companion  "  (Ramsay,  "  St.  Paul  the  Travel- 
ler," p.  177). 

33 


34     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

(Acts  12  :  25).  Barnabas  and  Saul  may  have 
stopped  at  the  home  of  Mary  during  their 
stay  in  Jerusalem.  Peter  and  the  apostles 
were  apparently  away.  The  absence  of 
Peter,  Mark's  "chosen  friend  and  teacher," 
made  Mark  more  open  to  the  influence  of  his 
cousin  Barnabas  and  to  the  personality  of 
Saul,  a  protege  of  Barnabas,  whom  he  had 
brought  from  Tarsus  to  Antioch  to  help  him 
in  the  work  there  (Acts  11:25  f .).  Probably 
both  men  had  been  considering  Mark's  use- 
ful gifts  for  the  campaign  among  the  Gentiles 
which  they  may  already  have  been  planning 
(Rackham,  p.  183).  "  He  had  a  good 
knowledge  of  Greek  together  with  the  faculty 
of  composition.  Moreover  he  was  thoroughly 
acquainted  with  the  teaching  of  Peter  and  the 
oral  traditions  of  the  church  of  Jerusalem  " 
(Jbid.).  If  he  had  already  had  some  experi- 
ence with  Peter  as  interpreter,  so  much  the 
better.  **  But  he  had  been  living  among  the 
narrow  prejudices  of  the  Jerusalem  church, 
and  the  sequel  suggests  that  the  relation- 
ship with  Barnabas  rather  than  his  sympathy 
with  Saul's  views  led  him  to  accompany  him  " 
(Furneaux,  *'Acts,"  pp.  189  f.).  So,  perhaps 
without  great  stirrings  of  heart,  Mark  con- 


THE  CALL  OF  OPPOETUNITY       36 

sented  to  go  to  Antioch.  It  wels  a  pleasant 
enough  journey  and  there  was  a  chance  of 
being  of  service.  So  he  agreed  to  go. 
**This  incidental  notice  of  John  Mark  may 
well  emphasize  the  fact  that  he  was  taken 
with  Paul  and  Barnabas  as  a  supernumerary, 
and  to  mark  his  secondary  character  as  com- 
pared with  them"  (Knowling,  "Commentary," 
p.  281).  But  Mary  may  well  have  had  flut- 
tering of  heart  as  her  son  started  out  upon 
what  proved  to  be  a  great  expedition.  Rack- 
ham  ("  Commentary,"  p.  183)  thinks  that 
the  Roman  '^praenomen"  Marcus  was  given 
John  at  this  juncture  with  a  view  to  its  giving 
him  some  help  in  his  travels,  "  like  most  Jews 
who  travelled  in  the  Graeco-Roman  world." 
But  of  that  we  do  not  know.  At  any  rate 
Mark  was  willing  to  go  with  Barnabas  and 
Saul  to  Antioch.* 

2.    With  Two  Great  Men. 

It  may  be  that  Mark  was  not  quite  aware 
of  the  spiritual  greatness  of  the  two  men  who 
invited  him  to  be  their  companion  to  Antioch. 
He  ought  to  have  appreciated  Barnabas,  his 

*  The  reading  "  to  "  (e^'f)  Jerusalem  is  manifestly  er- 
roneous even  though  supported  by  ^  B, 


36     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

kinsman,  though  sometimes  ties  of  blood 
make  it  harder  to  appraise  one  so  near  to  us. 
Saul  had  not  yet  come  to  the  full  stature  of 
his  manhood  in  Christ,  but  his  great  gifts 
were  long  ago  made  manifest  in  the  persecu- 
tion of  the  Jews  which  he  had  led.  The  fact 
that  Barnabas  had  championed  Saul's  cause 
and  believed  his  story,  when  the  other  leaders 
in  Jerusalem  were  both  sceptical  and  afraid 
(Acts  9 :  26 f.),  and  had  himself  brought  Saul 
from  Tarsus  to  Antioch  to  help  him  in  his 
work,  would  predispose  Mark  to  look  on 
Saul  with  admiration.  **  The  personality  of 
Saul  may  have  kindled  the  young  man's 
enthusiasm"  (Furneaux,  "Acts,"  p.  189). 
There  is  nothing  that  appeals  to  a  young 
man  more  strongly  than  a  really  great  man. 
Hero  worship  comes  natural  to  youth.  Usu- 
ally they  know  the  quality  of  their  heroes 
pretty  well.  Ramsay^  notes  the  "curiously 
incidental  way"  in  which  "John  Mark  is 
brought  before  the  reader's  notice  here" 
in  order  "  to  emphasize  the  secondary  char- 
acter of  John  Mark  "  "  as  a  supernumerary 
and  subordinate."  "  The  silence  is  singularly 
expressive  and  therefore  calculated "  on 
*"St.  Paul  the  Traveller  and  Roman  Citizen,"  p.  71. 


THE  CALL  OF  OPPOETUNITY       37 

Luke's  part.  But  there  was  no  effort  on  the 
part  of  Barnabas  and  Saul  to  depreciate  Mark 
or  to  make  him  feel  uncomfortable.  They 
probably  had  high  hopes  for  his  future.  At 
any  rate,  after  delivering  their  alms  from 
Antioch,  "  they  took  back  in  exchange  some 
living  gold — they  took  with  them  John 
Mark"  (Rackham,  "Acts,"  p.  183).  Great 
preachers  are  constantly  on  the  lookout  for 
other  men  with  the  divine  spark  of  consecra- 
tion that  lifts  a  man  out  of  the  ordinary  and 
that  makes  possible  the  highest  usefulness. 
Did  John  Mark  possess  the  holy  fire  that 
would  kindle  a  flame  in  other  lives,  among 
Greeks  as  well  as  among  Jews  ?  He  had  prob- 
ably served  his  apprenticeship  with  Simon 
Peter  among  the  Jews  and  the  Romans.  Now 
he  was  to  have  his  chance  with  the  Greeks. 

3.    In  a  Greek  Church. 

In  Antioch  Mark  would  be  able  to  see  for 
himself  what  the  Holy  Spirit  was  doing  with 
and  for  the  Greeks.  He  knew  the  story  of 
the  work  in  Jerusalem  from  Pentecost  on. 
He  may  have  seen  the  Roman  Pentecost  at 
Caesarea  in  the  house  of  Cornelius.  At 
Antioch  he  witnessed  the  outpouring  of  the 


38     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

Holy  Spirit  upon  the  Greek  church  "  as  they 
ministered  to  the  Lord  and  fasted"  (Acts 
13:2).  There  were  prophets  and  teachers  in 
that  church,  as  there  ought  to  be  in  every 
church,  men  with  the  prophetic  message  and 
the  teaching  gift.  Indeed,  each  preacher 
ought  to  combine  these  two  functions  in 
varying  degrees.  Christianity  cannot  well 
make  progress  without  both  gifts  whether 
found  in  one  man  or  in  two.  The  prophet 
is  needed  first  to  set  on  fire  the  soul  with 
holy  passion,  but  the  teacher  must  follow 
with  instruction  to  keep  the  fire  burning  else 
it  may  burn  out.  No  mention  is  made  of 
Mark's  attitude  toward  the  great  event  in 
Antioch  when  the  Holy  Spirit  made  a  dis- 
tinct call  for  Barnabas  and  Saul  to  be  set 
apart  "  for  the  work  whereunto  I  have  called 
them"  (13:2).  This  was  not  a  call  to  be- 
come missionaries  in  the  sense  of  preaching 
to  Gentiles,  for  this  was  a  Gentile  church  in 
Antioch  and  both  men  had  already  entered 
upon  that  work.  But  it  was  a  call  to  go  on 
a  great  world  campaign  to  win  Gentiles  to 
Christ.  At  Caesarea  and  at  Antioch  the  im- 
pulse had  come  from  God  and  the  work  had 
not  yet  spread  far  and  no  formal  program 


THE  CALL  OF  OPPOETUNITY       39 

for  further  expansion  had  been  proposed. 
Mark  probably  knew  of  the  way  that  the 
Pharisaic  Christians  in  Jerusalem  had  tried 
to  discredit  Peter's  work  in  Caesarea  (Acts 
ii:i-i8)  and  the  skillful  defense  made  by 
Peter  with  their  reluctant  acquiescence.  But 
now  a  new  crisis  was  sprung.  The  church 
at  Antioch  was  called  upon  by  the  Holy 
Spirit,  or  at  least  the  prophets  and  teachers 
were,  to  approve  the  new  and  epochal  cam- 
paign among  the  Gentiles.  They  were  not 
asked  to  pay  for  it,  but  to  pray  for  it.  This 
they  did  with  great  heartiness,  for  they  were 
Greeks  themselves,  and  that  is  more  than 
the  church  at  Jerusalem  would  have  done 
with  so  many  Pharisaic  Christians  in  the 
membership  and  with  the  apostles  scattered 
over  the  world.  It  was  a  stirring  time.  Jeru- 
salem had  tarried  too  long  and  had  lost 
her  primacy  in  the  kingdom.  The  twelve 
aposdes  were  still  preaching  to  Jews,  save 
Peter's  experience  at  Caesarea.  The  Great 
Commission  was  now  to  be  carried  out  by 
two  men  not  in  the  college  of  the  twelve, 
but  both  apostles  (missionaries)  in  the  real 
sense  of  the  word  and  both  specifically  called 
to  this  great  enterprise.     John  Mark  was  in- 


40     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

evitably  moved  by  what  he  saw  and  heard  at 
Antioch. 


4.    Barnabas'  Leadership. 

This  is  made  plain  by  the  call  of  the  Holy 
Spirit.  Barnabas  is  named  before  Saul  as 
the  head  of  the  expedition.  In  the  list  of 
prophets  and  teachers  named  in  the  church 
in  Antioch  (Acts  13 :  i)  Barnabas  heads  the 
list  and  Saul  comes  last.  It  will  hardly  do 
to  say  that  Luke  is  staging  his  persons  for 
dramatic  effect.  Saul  could  well  recall  the 
words  of  Jesus  to  him  in  Jerusalem:  "De- 
part: for  I  will  send  thee  forth  far  hence 
unto  the  Gentiles  "  (Acts  22  :  21).  But  Jesus 
had  not  said  to  Saul  that  he  was  to  be  the 
great  apostle  of  the  ages  to  the  Gentiles. 
That  belonged  to  the  future  and  Saul  had 
gladly  cooperated  with  Barnabas  in  Antioch 
and  was  apparently  glad  enough  to  work 
under  him  in  the  new  arrangement.  Barna- 
bas had  been  sent  to  Antioch  by  the  Jeru- 
salem church  (Acts  11 :  22),  but  he  had  con- 
served the  independence  of  the  Antiochian 
church  while  preserving  the  utmost  amity  by 
taking  alms  to  the  relief  of  the  Jerusalem 
poor  (ii:29f.)  at  the  time  of  the  famine; 


THE  CALL  OF  OPPOETUNITY       41 

John  Mark  probably  took  his  cousin's  leader- 
ship as  a  matter  of  course  as  did  the  whole 
church  at  Antioch.  Saul  was  still  just  the 
co-worker  of  Barnabas. 

5.    To  Go  On  or  to  Go  Back. 

John  Mark  had  not  been  named  by  the 
Holy  Spirit  in  the  call,  but  only  Barnabas 
and  Saul.  The  farewell  meeting  was  evi- 
dendy  held  in  honor  of  Barnabas  and  Saul 
and,  after  fasting  and  prayer,  hands  were 
laid  upon  them,  not  in  the  technical  sense  of 
**  ordination "  to  the  ministry  or  for  the  be- 
stowal of  the  Holy  Spirit.  Both  had  already 
received  the  gift  of  the  Holy  Spirit  (Acts 
9  : 1 7  ;  1 1  :  24)  and  both  had  long  been  active 
ministers.  It  was  a  sort  of  dedicatory  service 
in  view  of  the  new  and  solemn  enterprise  to 
which  they  were  called  by  the  Holy  Spirit. 
Certainly  Saul,  in  view  of  the  events  con- 
nected with  his  conversion  and  the  message 
of  Jesus  through  Ananias  (Acts  9:6,  15  f. ; 
22  :  14  f.)  was  only  too  willing  to  enter  this 
open  door.  He  had  not  been  idle  at  Tarsus, 
but  here  at  last  was  his  real  life-work.  The 
duty  of  Barnabas  was  clear  and  his  work  at 
Antioch   with   the   Greeks  had  the  seal  of 


42     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

God's  blessing  (Acts  1 1 ;  24-26)  and  the  Holy 
Spirit's  present  call  was  explicit.  He  was 
under  orders  and  he  was  ready  to  go.  What 
was  John  Mark  to  do?  A  narrow  and  sensi- 
tive man  might  have  shown  irritation  or  even 
resentment  at  not  being  named  in  the  call  of 
the  Holy  Spirit.  He  was  only  "an  extra 
hand "  (Ramsay,  "  St.  Paul  the  Traveller," 
p.  71)  taken  on  the  responsibility  of  Barnabas 
and  Saul.  One  step  at  a  time  is  the  way 
that  God  leads  us.  Mark  had  come  to  An- 
tioch  with  Barnabas  and  Saul.  Now  they 
were  clearly  led  on  and  out  into  a  world 
campaign  for  Christ  upon  a  quest  full  of  ad- 
venture and  uncertainty.  The  very  novelty 
of  it  all  would  appeal  to  a  young  man  like 
Mark.  Barnabas  and  Saul  wanted  him  to  go 
on  with  them  and  explained  how  they  needed 
him  and  could  make  his  journey  useful  as  well 
as  agreeable.  So  he  agreed  to  go  on  with 
them.  Perhaps  he  sent  back  a  message  to 
his  mother  Mary  about  this  further  step  and 
asked  for  her  approval  and  for  her  prayers. 
The  party  were  sent  forth  by  the  Holy  Spirit 
and  with  the  best  wishes  of  the  Greek  church  in 
Antioch  (Acts  13:3  f.)now  become  the  center  of 
one  of  the  great  world  movements  of  all  time. 


Ill 

TAKING  A  HUMBLE  PLACE 


"And  they  had  also  John  as  their  attendant." 

— Acts  13:5. 


in 

TAKING  A  HUMBLE  PLACE 

PRECISELY  what  John  Mark's  place  in 
the  company  was  we  do  not  know, 
but  certainly  it  was  a  subordinate  one. 
Here  was  a  call  from  man  and  not  to  a  very 
high  place.  Was  it  also  the  call  of  God  and 
was  it  worth  while  ?  Very  few  young  min- 
isters are  placed  at  once  upon  a  pinnacle 
and,  if  they  are,  they  often  become  dizzy  and 
sometimes  fall.  In  the  ministry,  as  in  busi- 
ness callings,  it  matters  far  more  what  one 
does  with  his  position  than  what  the 
place  is.  It  is  far  better  to  do  a  big  work 
in  a  little  place  than  a  little  work  in  a  big 
place.  It  is  not  even  certain  what  John 
had  to  do. 

I.    The  Synagogue  Minister  ? 

The  word^  here  translated  '*  attendant"  is 

*  onrjpiTTjv.     Literally    an     under-rower    with    other 
rowers  above  one  in  the  boat. 

45 


46     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

sometimes  used  for  the  official  chazzan  or 
synagogue  minister  as  in  Luke  4  :  20.  The 
Greek  idiom  quite  allows  this  translation. 
*•  The  clause  is  in  close  connection  with  the 
mention  of  synagogues  ;  the  omission  of  the 
article  is  common  in  the  case  of  official 
titles ;  and,  if  it  was  a  predicate,  the  natural 
order  of  the  Greek  words  would  be  different " 
(Furneaux,  '*  Acts,'*  p.  197).  This  is  all  true 
and  makes  out  at  least  a  plausible  argument 
for  this  translation.  The  word  is  used  also 
for  "  officers  "  who  were  sent  to  arrest  Jesus 
(John  7  :  32,  45).  The  chazzan  in  the  syna- 
gogue in  Luke  4 :  20  handed  the  Lord  Jesus 
the  roll  like  a  modern  beadle  or  sexton.  If 
this  view  be  taken,  we  have  another  item 
about  Mark  that  links  him  closely  with 
Judaism.  He  would,  as  a  regular  synagogue 
minister,  be  very  handy  in  the  preaching 
services  which  were  always  held  in  the  syna- 
gogues if  allowed  by  the  Jewish  authorities. 
This  was  Paul's  constant  practice,  as  we 
know,  except  in  a  few  cases  as  at  Lystra 
(Acts  14  :  15).  There  were  excellent  reasons 
for  this  conduct  even  though  Paul  was  the 
apostle  to  the  Gentiles.  He  still  felt  that  the 
Gospel  came  to  the  Jew  first  (Rom.  2  :  10) 


TAKING  A  HUMBLE  PLACE         47 

and,  being  a  Jewish  rabbi  himself,  the  heathen 
in  the  public  places  would  be  prejudiced 
against  him  as  toward  all  Jews  (cf.  the  case 
of  Alexander  at  Ephesus,  Acts  19  :  34).  Be- 
sides, as  a  rabbi,  he  would  have  access  to  the 
synagogues  and  there  would  also  meet  the 
many  God-fearing  Gentiles  (Acts  17:17)  who 
had  turned  to  Judaism  for  some  relief  from 
the  myths  and  licentiousness  of  current 
heathenism  or  from  the  still  worse  emperor 
cult.  **  Hence  the  synagogue  attracted  nu- 
merous proselytes,  and  a  preacher  of  the 
Gospel  found  in  it  a  bridge  over  which  to 
pass  to  pagan  circles "  (Furneaux,  "  Acts," 
p.  197). 

2.     The  Baptizer  ? 

We  know  that  Peter  *'  commanded  them  to 
be  baptized  in  the  name  of  Jesus  Christ" 
(Acts  ID :  48)  when  Cornelius  and  his  house- 
hold were  converted.  John  Mark,  as  we 
have  seen,  may  have  been  one  of  the  six 
with  Peter  who  attended  to  this  baptizing. 
Paul  usually  had  others  to  do  the  baptizing 
for  him  to  keep  down  small  jealousies  on 
that  point  (i  Cor.  i  :  14-17).  Blass  (Acts,  171 
loco)  explains  "  attendant "  or  *'  minister  "  as 


48     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

"  for  baptizing  '*  (velut  ad  baptizanduni).  The 
prophets  sometimes  had  servants  or  attend- 
ants as  Elisha  to  Elijah  (i  Kings  19:21) 
and  Gehazi  to  Elisha  (2  Kings  4: 12).  It  is 
hardly  likely  that  John  Mark  came  along 
to  do  simply  personal  service  to  Barnabas 
and  Saul.  We  may  be  sure  that  there  was 
baptizing  to  be  done  in  most  of  the  places 
where  Barnabas  and  Saul  preached. 

3.    The  Dragoman  ? 

"But  the  word  may  express  the  fact  that 
John  Mark  was  able  to  set  the  apostles 
more  free  for  their  work  of  evangelizing'' 
(Knowling,  "Acts,"  p.  285).  He  may  have 
made  "arrangements  for  board,  lodging, 
and  travelling"  (Furneaux,  "Acts,"  p.  197). 
Evangelists  to-day  sometimes  have  advance 
agents,  advertising  or  publicity  men,  singers, 
personal  workers,  Bible  class  leaders,  and 
what  not,  a  regular  company.  It  is  to-day 
often  "Smith  and  party,"  "Jones  and  party." 
There  is  no  reason  to  refuse  to  admit  some 
business  organization  in  this  new  enterprise. 
Whether  they  started  out  with  money  or  not, 
the  time  came  when  Paul  made  his  own  sup- 
port and  that  of  his  friends  by  working  at 


TAKING  A  HUMBLE  PLACE         49 

his  trade.  There  were  no  boards  to  care  for 
the  new  missionaries.  There  is  no  evidence 
that  the  church  at  Antioch  contemplated 
financial  responsibility  for  the  campaign. 
They  evidently  did  not  mean  to  underwrite 
the  expenses  of  the  mission  band  for  whom 
they  so  fervently  prayed,  for  Paul  later  ex- 
pressly says  that  in  the  beginning  the  Phi- 
lippians  alone  had  a  share  with  him  in  the 
mission  enterprise  (Phil.  4 :  15).  That  crown 
belongs  to  Philippi,  not  to  Antioch.  But 
there  were  business  details  of  various  kinds 
that  demanded  attention  and  Mark  was  ready 
for  them. 

4.     The  Assistant  Preacher  ? 

"  As  an  assistant — in  what  ?  *  Also/  as  I 
think,  recalls  most  naturally  'preached  the 
word ' ;  and  the  answer  would  be  that  he 
assisted  them  in  the  declaration  of  the  word  " 
(Hackett,  "Acts,"  p.  151).  Hackett  recog- 
nizes that  he  stands  almost  alone  in  this 
view.  And  yet  it  would  be  hard  to  deny 
that  John  Mark  would  be  allowed  to  preach 
the  Gospel  as  occasion  offered.  There  may 
have  been  overflow  meetings  or  crowds  in 
front  of  the  synagogues  or  after-meetings  or 


50     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

meetings  in  the  homes  as  at  his  mother's 
home  in  Jerusalem  where  he  could  well  exer- 
cise his  gifts  as  a  preacher  of  the  Gospel. 
It  may  be  fairly  asked  why  John  Mark's 
position  has  to  be  precisely  defined ;  why,  in 
fact,  there  may  not  be  an  element  of  truth  in 
all  these  points  of  view  which  are  not  at  all 
contradictory.  He  was  ready  for  any  service 
that  was  required  to  help  on  the  work,  a  man 
of  all  work  for  the  party.  One  of  the  most 
needed  tasks  was  to  instruct  the  catechu- 
mens. Mark  was  one  who  **had  not  the 
same  gift  of  preaching  to  the  unconverted, 
but  who  had  an  excellent  memory,  and  a  full 
knowledge  of  all  those  great  events  which 
were  being  told  among  them  ;  and  he  (Paul) 
turned  over  the  'catechumens'  to  this  *  attend- 
ant '  or  *  minister.'  Mark  would  take  the  in- 
quirers aside,  and  in  some  quiet  place  he 
would  begin  to  tell  the  story  of  the  Gospel  in 
detail.  He  would  meet  them  again  and 
again  for  as  long  as  they  were  in  the  place  " 
(Moulton,  "  From  Egyptian  Rubbish  Heaps," 
1916,  p.  93). 

5.     If  Less  Honor,  Less  Responsibility. 
There  was   this   to   be  said  from  Mark's 


TAKING  A  HUMBLE  PLACE         51 

standpoint.  He  was  in  no  sense  the  head, 
or  even  a  head,  of  the  party.  Somebody  has 
to  do  the  humbler  tasks  in  Christian  work. 
An  army  of  generals  and  captains  would  not 
be  very  formidable.  It  is  the  man  in  the 
trenches  who  does  the  chief  work  after  all  if 
he  executes  it  well.  The  sequel,  however, 
makes  it  clear  that  the  responsibility  for  this 
enterprise  rested  rather  lightly  on  Mark's 
shoulders.  He  may  not  have  found  it  as 
congenial  as  he  had  hoped.  The  little  foxes 
eat  away  the  vines.  There  is  a  dull  drag  that 
comes  in  humdrum  work  that  tries  the  spirit. 
Many  a  young  preacher  balks  at  the  petty 
details  of  scholarly  pursuits  and  refuses  to 
pay  the  price  for  great  attainments  by  the 
slavish  drudgery  of  prolonged  application  to 
real  research.  The  dust  and  grime  of  the 
mine  drive  away  the  charm  of  the  gold  and 
the  diamond. 

6.    Willing  to  Start  at  This  Level. 

But  it  must  not  be  forgotten  that  John  Mark 
did  set  out  on  this  great  tour  as  the  mere 
**  attendant "  of  Barnabas  and  Saul.  That  is 
all  to  his  credit  and  is  worth  noting.  It 
is  a  long  way  from  flagman  on  a  train  to 


52     MAKENTG  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

president  of  the  railroad  and  yet  men  have 
traversed  that  path.  The  bell-boy  may 
some  day  be  the  bank  president.  The  student 
will  become  the  professor.  The  tyro  will  be- 
come the  expert.  The  boy  in  the  pew  will 
become  the  peerless  preacher.  The  people 
at  Nazareth  could  not  get  over  their  astonish- 
ment that  "the  carpenter"  (Mark  6:3),  as 
they  knew  Jesus,  could  be  the  rabbi  whose 
fame  was  now  upon  the  lips  of  all,  or  even 
the  Messiah  of  promise  as  some  dared  to 
affirm.  He  was  great  first  as  carpenter  be- 
fore He  came  to  be  great  as  teacher  and 
Master  of  men's  hearts  and  lives.  All  young 
preachers  have  to  start  somewhere.  Broadus 
used  to  say  that  the  only  way  to  preach  is  to 
preach.  One  may  learn  all  the  theory  of 
swimming  and  yet  drown  because  he  does 
not  know  how  to  swim.  The  door  for  the 
preacher  to  enter  is  the  one  that  is  open,  not 
those  that  are  closed. 


IV 

FLICKERING  IN  A  CRISIS 

*^  Now  Paul  and  his  company  set  sail  from  Paphos, 
and  came  to  Perga  in  Pamphylia  :  and  John  de- 
parted from  them  and  returned  to  Jerusalem.'' 

—Acts  13:  13. 


IV 

FLICKERING  IN  A  CRISIS 

I.    Deserting  Paul  and  Barnabas  at  Perga. 

MARK  is  kept  distinctly  in  the  back- 
ground by  Luke,  for  Paul  is  his 
hero  in  Acts  13  to  28.  What  did 
Mark  think  of  the  new  situation  that  de- 
veloped at  Paphos  and  what  was  his  subse- 
quent conduct  ?  We  seldom  act  from  single 
motives.  One  may  be  at  the  moment  the 
strongest  on  the  occasion  for  action,  the  last 
straw  on  the  camel's  back  as  we  say,  like  the 
rebuke  of  Judas  Iscariot  by  Christ  at  the 
feast  in  Bethany,  but,  once  the  spark  is 
lighted,  the  other  fagots  add  fuel  to  the 
flame.  At  Perga  in  Pamphylia  John  Mark 
(John,  his  Jewish  name,  Luke  calls  him  here 
and  in  13:5;  but  Mark,  his  Roman  name,  in 
15-39.  and  both  in  12  :  12,  25  ;  15  137),  sud- 
denly left  the  party  and  went  back,  not  to 
Antioch,  but  to  Jerusalem.  Luke  proffers  no 
55 


56     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

explanation  of  any  kind,  but  shows  later  (15  : 
37-39)  that  Paul  strongly  resented  what  he  con- 
sidered Mark's  desertion  of  the  work  in  a  cri- 
sis. Luke  makes  a  colorless  report  of  Mark's 
conduct  at  this  stage :  "  John  departed  from 
them  and  returned  to  Jerusalem."  There 
was  a  sharp  cleavage  ^  and  a  return  ^  home. 
But  in  15  :  38  Paul,  as  we  shall  see,  practically 
accused  Mark  of  apostasy^  from  the  work 
which  he  had  undertaken.  Mark  may  not 
have  foreseen  the  serious  results  that  were  to 
follow  this  act  of  his.  There  was  probably 
some  petulance  and  heat  on  his  part,  a 
"  flare-up "  when  he  left.  He  was  clearly 
unwilling  to  go  on  and  was  not  offering  his 
resignation  in  order  to  be  asked  to  withdraw 
it  and  stay  with  the  party.  It  is  always  a 
serious  question  for  a  pastor  to  offer  his 
resignation.  He  is  not  always  able  to  see 
all  sides  of  the  problem.  People  are  not 
always  frank  and  sincere  with  him,  Some 
will  urge  him  to  stay  who  really  wish  him  to 
go.     Some   will   say  nothing   who  secretly 

*  d.7:o^(opTJ(Ta<^  d.Tc'  aOraJv.  These  words  accent  the 
separation. 

^  vTtiazpecl'^v  the  same  word  employed  in  12:25  of 
the  return  from  Jerusalem  to  Antioch. 


FLICKEEING  IN  A  CEISIS  57 

hope  that  he  will  go.  A  noisy  minority  may 
override  the  will  of  the  majority.  But  a  pas- 
tor can  stay  too  long  as  he  can  go  too  soon. 
It  is  easy  to  be  too  sensitive  and  then  not  to 
be  sensitive  enough.  Many  a  young  minis- 
ter injures  his  whole  ministerial  career  by  not 
making  good  in  his  first  pastorate  and  finds 
it  hard  to  get  another  pastorate.  Once  out 
he  has  difficulty  in  getting  in  again.  Mark 
takes  an  almost  fatal  step  and  quits  all  of  a 
sudden  and  goes  home  as  a  returned  mis- 
sionary. He  is  in  an  embarrassing  position  at 
once.  Many  a  young  minister  has  found  the 
work  at  college  or  at  seminary  surprisingly 
hard  and  has  suddenly  thrown  up  his  scho- 
lastic training.  He  dodges  Perga  for  a 
short-cut  into  the  ministry.  Mark  never  for- 
got Perga.  It  haunted  him  through  the 
years.  What  made  him  quit  at  Perga? 
Paul  and  Barnabas  were  also  at  Perga  and 
went  on.  Why  did  Mark  turn  back  ?  They 
all  faced  the  same  difficulties,  the  same  ob- 
stacles. There  are  two  ways  to  treat  obstacles 
in  one's  path,  to  turn  back  or  to  climb  over 
them.  Napoleon  said,  "There  shall  be  no 
Alps,"  and  went  over  the  top  into  Italy. 
Mark  turned  back. 


68     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

2.     Irritation  at  Paul's  Preeminence. 

At  Paphos  **  Saul,  who  is  also  called  Paul  '* 
(Acts  13:9),  took  the  lead  and  sternly  re- 
buked Elymas  Barjesus,  the  Jewish  sorcerer, 
and  broke  his  power  over  Sergius  Paulus, 
the  proconsul.  The  result  was  tremendous. 
Elymas  was  smitten  with  blindness  and  "  he 
went  about  seeking  some  one  to  lead  him  by 
the  hand"  (13  :  11)  and  the  proconsul  "be- 
lieved, being  astonished  at  the  teaching  of  the 
Lord  "  (13  :  12).  But  now  also  "  Paul  and  his 
company  set  sail  from  Paphos  "(13:13).  It 
is  significant  that  from  now  on  Luke  usually 
has  "  Paul "  instead  of  "  Saul "  and  that  this 
forward  step  on  Paul's  part  takes  place  in 
connection  with  a  man  named  "Paulus." 
These  two  "  Pauls  "  faced  each  other  in  the 
court  at  Paphos  and  the  preacher  won  the 
proconsul,  the  first  man  in  rank  in  Cyprus. 
**  St.  Paul  generally  accepted  a  scene  before 
the  authorities  as  bringing  his  work  in  a  city 
to  an  end  "  (Rackham,  "  Acts,"  p.  203).  At 
any  rate  Paul  is  now  the  leader,^  though  Bar- 
nabas had  been  specifically  named  as  head  of 

*  ol  Tzepi  UdbXov.  This  ancient  Greek  idiom  neatly  sets 
forth  Paul  (**  those  around  Paul  '*)  as  the  center  of  the 
party.  Cf.  Robertson,  **  Grammar  of  the  Greek  New 
Testament  in  the  Light  of  Historical  Research,"  p.  620. 


FLICKEEING  IN  A  CEISIS  69 

the  expedition  in  the  call  of  the  Holy  Spirit 
(13:2).  "The  young  cousin  felt  a  jealousy 
to  which  the  generous  Barnabas  was  him- 
self superior"  (Furneaux,  "Acts,"  p.  203). 
Clearly  Barnabas  exhibited  no  chagrin  at  the 
new  power  that  Paul  displayed  and  rejoiced 
in  his  prowess.  It  is  good  when  an  older 
minister  can  rejoice  at  the  achievements  of 
the  more  gifted  younger  man  whom  he  has 
helped  to  get  a  start.  "In  nothing  is  the 
greatness  of  Barnabas  more  manifest  than  in 
his  recognition  of  the  superiority  of  Paul  and 
acceptance  of  a  secondary  position  for  him- 
self "  (Furneaux,  ihid^j.  But  Mark  probably 
felt  resentment  on  Barnabas'  account  and 
may  have  showed  it.  These  litde  jealousies 
appeared  among  the  twelve  apostles  during 
Christ's  ministry  and  ministers  to-day  are 
subject  to  them  like  other  men.  The  occasions 
for  them  test  one's  caliber.  This  spirit  is 
sometimes  a  defect  of  a  great  man,  though 
usually  the  sign  of  a  weak  one. 

3.    The  Change  of  Plan. 

Findlay  (Hastings'  Dictionary  of  the  Bible, 
art.  Paul)  suggests  that  the  repetition  of  the 
phrase  "  the  work  "  (13  :  2  ;    14  :  26  ;  15  :  38) 


60     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

in  Luke's  narrative  shows  that  the  whole  cam- 
paign had  been  mapped  out  before  leaving 
Antioch.  At  any  rate  there  was  a  change  of 
leaders.  Cyprus  was  the  old  home  of  Barna- 
bas and  the  visit  there  was  probably  his  sug- 
gestion. What  is  now  Paul's  plan  ?  Rack- 
ham  ("  Acts,"  p.  205)  thinks  that  Paul  really 
wanted  to  go  to  Ephesus  as  he  sought  to  go 
in  the  second  journey  (Acts  16  :  6)  and  hoped 
to  find  a  ship  at  Perga  for  Ephesus.  Ramsay 
(*•  St.  Paul  the  Traveller  and  Roman  Citizen," 
pp.  89  f.)  holds  that  Pamphylia  was  to  be  the 
sphere  of  work  among  a  people  somewhat 
like  those  in  Cilicia,  Syria,  and  Cyprus 
where  Paul  had  already  labored.  Ramsay 
suggests  that  Paul  contracted  the  malaria  at 
Perga  from  the  mosquitoes  on  the  Cestrus 
River  and  hence  made  a  radical  change  of 
plan  to  go  on  and  up  through  the  dangerous 
mountain  passes  to  Antioch  in  Pisidia  where 
he  could  recover  from  the  malaria  on  the  ele- 
vated plateau  (3,600  feet  above  sea  level). 
He  appeals  to  Galatians  4  :  13  f.  as  proof  of 
this  view  which  is  on  the  basis  of  the  South 
Galatian  theory  that  Paul  in  Galatians  is 
writing  to  the  churches  in  Pisidia  and  Lycao- 
nia  established  during  this  first  tour.     Ram- 


FLICKEEING  IN  A  CEISIS  61 

say  holds  that  the  sickness  referred  to  by 
Paul  in  Galatians  4  :  13  f.  as  the  occasion  of 
his  preaching  in  Galatia  began  in  Perga.  He 
also  interprets  *'  the  splinter  ^  in  the  flesh  " 
(2  Cor.  I2:7f.)  as  the  recurring  attacks  of 
malaria  (the  sudden  chills  or  spasms)  which 
humiliated  him  before  the  heathen  who  in- 
terpreted these  spells  as  punishments  from 
the  gods.  At  any  rate  a  change  of  plan  seems 
to  have  been  made  at  Perga.  If  Paul  decided 
to  go  to  Antioch  in  Pisidia  for  his  health  Mark 
may  have  interpreted  it  "  as  an  abandonment 
of  the  work"  (Knowling,  "Acts,"  p.  289). 
This  would  be  a  possible  retort  to  Paul's  charge 
that  Mark  had  deserted  the  work.  Certainly 
a  division  of  opinion  arose  and  Mark  refused 
to  go  further  along  the  new  path.  He  could 
say  that  he  had  not  agreed  to  go  to  Pisidia 
and  Lycaonia  and  be  technically  correct. 

4.   Paul's  Aggressive  Attitude  Toward  Gen- 
tiles. 
We  do  not  have  to  say  that  it  was  merely 

*  "  And  he  told  me  that  you  had  a  sore  foot  owing  to 
a  splinter  "  ka\  eini  fiot  ore  tov  nodav  Trove??  <iro 
ff/zoXdr.oo  (B.  G.  U.  380  iii.  a.  d.).  This  sentence  oc- 
curs in  the  letter  of  an  anxious  mother  who  has  heard  of 
the  injury  to  her  son's  foot. 


62     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

a  personal  matter  on  Mark^s  part.  He  prob- 
ably sympathized  to  some  extent  with  the 
standpoint  of  the  Pharisaic  element  in  Jeru- 
salem. Peter  himself  required  a  vision  from 
the  Lord  to  enable  him  to  go  to  Cornelius  in 
Caesarea  and  to  preach  a  free  Gospel  to  him 
and  his  household.  Even  there  Peter  was 
openly  apologetic  (Acts  lo :  28)  and  only 
there  perceived  that  God  would  save  Gen- 
tiles without  their  becoming  Jews  (10:34) 
and  in  Jerusalem  made  it  plain  that  God 
had  opened  the  door  to  the  Romans  in 
Caesarea  (11:1-18).  Barnabas  had  firmly 
maintained  the  freedom  of  the  Greek  Chris- 
tians in  Antioch  from  Jewish  observances 
(i  1 :  23  ff.).  But  Paul's  aggressive  spirit  seems 
to  have  longed  for  a  great  drive  for  the  Gen- 
tiles whether  the  Jews  responded  or  not. 
Precisely  that  situation  arose  in  Antioch  in 
Pisidia  and  Mark  may  have  foreseen  it  or 
suspected  it.  "  Seeing  ye  thrust  it  from 
you,  and  judge  yourselves  unworthy  of  eter- 
nal life,  lo,  we  turn  to  the  Gentiles'*  (Acts 
14 :  46).  "  We  conclude  then  that  Mark  was 
unable  to  keep  pace  with  the  rapid  expan- 
sion of  St.  Paul's  views  of  work  in  the 
Gentile  world"  (Rackham,  "Acts,"  p.  204). 


FLICKERING  IN  A  CRISIS  63 

Mark  may  have  intimated  that  the  conver- 
sion of  Sergius  Paulus  had  made  Paul  willing 
to  neglect  the  chosen  people. 

5.    Hazards  of  the  Hills  Ahead. 

Paul  himself  seems  to  refer  to  this  period 
of  his  life  when  he  speaks  of  "  perils  of  rivers," 
"  perils  of  robbers/'  and  "  perils  in  the  wilder- 
ness "  (2  Cor.  11:26).  Various  inscriptions 
in  this  region  between  Perga  and  Antioch  in 
Pisidia  tell  of  escape  from  drowning  in  a 
torrent  swollen  by  rain,  of  a  policeman  slain 
by  robbers,  of  armed  policemen  whose  duty 
it  was  to  capture  runaway  slaves  (often  the 
very  worst  brigands).  "  The  roads  all  over 
the  Roman  Empire  were  apt  to  be  unsafe,  for 
the  arrangements  for  insuring  public  safety 
were  exceedingly  defective  ;  but  probably  the 
part  of  his  life  which  St.  Paul  had  most  in 
mind  when  he  wrote  about  the  perils  of  rivers 
and  of  robbers,  which  he  had  faced  in  his 
journeys,  was  the  journey  from  Perga  across 
Taurus  to  Antioch  and  back  again ''  (Ramsay, 
"The  Church  in  the  Roman  Empire,"  1893, 
p.  24).  It  is  easy  to  see  how  Mark  could 
argue  that  he  had  not  agreed  to  go  into  such 
hazards.     If  it  was  springtime,  he  would  hear 


64     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

of  swollen  streams  and  of  bands  of  brigands. 
Besides,  it  was  not  his  expedition  anyhow. 
The  Holy  Spirit  had  not  named  him  in  the 
call  which  Barnabas  and  Saul  had  received. 
Mark  **  was  a  young  man,  and  had  perhaps 
entered  on  the  work  without  counting  the 
cost"  (Furneaux,  "Acts,"  p.  203).  He  had 
put  his  hand  to  the  plow,  but  was  now  look- 
ing back.  The  furrow  was  running  on  too 
far  for  him.  Mark  was  not  a  coward,  but  he 
was  faint-hearted  and  his  spirit  quailed  as  he 
contemplated  the  real  and  imaginary  dangers 
involved  in  a  trip  across  the  Taurus  moun- 
tains through  almost  trackless  forests.  The 
brigands  there  were  more  dangerous  than 
the  wild  beasts.  Perhaps  the  heart  of  many 
a  missionary  has  suffered  like  terrors  as  he 
came  face  to  face  with  the  grim  realities  of 
his  life-work.  Paul  had  much  to  say  to  Tim- 
othy about  enduring  hardness  as  a  soldier 
of  the  cross.  *'  Suffer  hardship  with  me,  as  a 
good  soldier  of  Christ  Jesus  "  (2  Tim.  2 : 3). 
Paul  was  a  true  soldier  and  captain.  He  did 
not  ask  his  followers  to  do  what  he  was  un- 
willing to  share  with  them.  But  Paul  had 
no  patience  with  the  tenderfoot.  He  wanted 
a   real   man  to   stand   in  his  place  in   the 


FLICKEEING  IN  A  CEISIS  65 

trenches.  *'  For  God  gave  us  not  a  spirit  of 
fearfulness ;  but  of  power  and  love  and  dis- 
cipline. Be  not  ashamed  therefore  of  the 
testimony  of  our  Lord,  nor  of  me  his  pris- 
oner: but  sufier  hardship  with  the  Gospel 
according  to  the  power  of  God "  (2  Tim. 
1 :  7  f.).  This  is  Paul's  message  to  all  men 
who  are  tempted  to  be  slackers  or  quitters 
in  the  ministry. 

6.    Homesickness. 

Certainly  he  went  home.  He  "returned 
to  Jerusalem."  Holtzmann  says  that  he  went 
home  "to  his  mother"  (zu  seiner  Mutter). 
A  ship  may  have  been  about  to  sail  from 
Perga  to  Caesarea  and  Mark  could  not  resist 
the  impulse  to  depart  (J.  Robertson,  "  Scenes 
from  the  Life  of  St.  Paul,"  p.  112).  Swete 
("Commentary,"  p.  xiii)  thinks  "that  duty 
to  his  mother  and  his  home  required  him  to 
break  ofi  at  this  point  from  so  perilous  a 
development  of  the  mission."  Depression 
probably  combined  with  the  other  influences 
already  mentioned  and  the  action,  once  taken, 
was  irrevocable.  He  was  ofi  for  home  and 
Paul  and  Barnabas  were  off  for  Antioch  in 
Pisidia.     It  is  even  possible  that  Mark  him- 


66     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINLSTRY 

self  had  a  touch  of  malaria  at  Perga.  If  that 
was  true,  it  was  the  decisive  thing  with  him. 
He  would  go  home  and  get  out  of  all  this 
entanglement  Malaria  and  homesickness 
make  a  powerful  combination  and  go  far 
toward  unnerving  a  man  for  real  work. 
When  the  physical  energy  is  sapped,  one's 
will  has  to  fight  the  battle.  Paul  fought  for 
the  hills  to  go  on  with  his  work.  Mark  fled 
home  to  see  his  mother  and  let  the  work  go. 
Mark  undoubtedly  loved  his  mother  as  he 
ought  to  have  done,  but  it  is  an  open  ques- 
tion whether  Mary  was  wholly  glad  to  see 
him  come  back  alone.  To  be  sure,  he  had 
his  story,  but  it  was  only  one  side  of  the 
matter.  Mary  had  felt  pride  in  seeing  her 
son  go  out  under  the  tutelage  of  two  such 
preachers  as  Barnabas  and  Saul.  There  was, 
no  doubt,  a  pang  of  disappointment  in  her 
heart  as  she  saw  him  come  home,  especially 
when  she  learned  of  Paul's  disapproval  and 
that  Barnabas  had  gone  on  with  Paul.  Life 
is  full  of  complex  problems  that  are  hard  to 
solve.  The  skein  gets  tangled  and  the 
temper  becomes  exasperated  till  we  cut  the 
Gordian  knot  and  then  we  may  cut  it  in  the 
wrong  place.     There  are  thousands  of  young 


FUCKEEING  IN  A  CEISIS  67 

ministers  who  will  understand  John  Mark's 
feelings  as  he  journeyed  home.  Had  he 
done  right  after  all?  What  was  he  to  do 
now  ?  A  young  minister  quits  his  college  or 
seminary  course  under  provocation  or  in 
despair  at  the  difficulties  met  at  Perga.  He 
resigns  his  first  pastorate  because  of  a  sudden 
clash  with  some  member  of  the  church  or 
because  the  work  seems  unusually  hard  or 
the  remuneration  inadequate  or  the  people 
indifferent  or  the  climate  unsuitable.  A 
young  missionary  suddenly  flings  up  his 
work  and  comes  home  and  finds  himself  in 
a  very  embarrassing  position.  He  is  not  a 
hero  to  others  and  his  courage  is  gone.  A 
Y.  M.  C.  A.  secretary  in  the  army  camps  has 
to  take  his  lot  with  the  men  in  camp  and  at 
the  front.  If  he  is  overly  particular,  he  will 
not  have  the  respect  of  the  men  whom  he  is 
trying  to  help.  We  all  meet  Perga,  but  Paul 
went  on  to  victory  and  power. 


V 

THROWN  OUT  OF  WORK 

"  And  Barnabas  was  minded  to  lake  with  them  John 
also,  who  was  called  Afark."—Acis  15  :  37. 


THROWN  OUT  OF  WORK 

I.    A  Spectator,  Not  a  Fighter. 

MARK  is  dropped  by  Luke  till  we 
come  to  Antioch  again  in  Acts  15 : 
36-41.  Much  water  has  run  under 
the  mill  in  the  meanwhile.  Paul  and  Barna- 
bas finished  their  great  tour  as  far  as  Derbe 
and  then  returned  to  Antioch  in  Syria  where 
*'  they  rehearsed  all  things  that  God  had  done 
with  them,  and  that  he  had  opened  a  door  of 
faith  unto  the  Gentiles"  (Acts  14:27).  It 
was  a  veritable  missionary  triumph  and 
echoes  of  this  great  event  reached  Jerusalem 
and  led  certain  self-appointed  leaders,  "to 
whom  we  gave  no  commandment"  (Acts 
15 :  24),  to  go  up  to  Antioch  to  file  formal 
protest  against  this  great  Gentile  propaganda 
by  Paul  and  Barnabas.  One  of  the  great 
issues  in  the  history  of  Christianity  was 
sprung  and  Paul  did  not  hesitate  a  moment 
to  champion  the  cause  of  spiritual  freedom 
71 


72     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

for  the  Gentile  Christians  against  the  bond- 
age of  Pharisaism  which  the  Judaizing  Chris- 
tians from  Jerusalem  wished  to  impose  upon 
them.  Luke  reports  the  conflict  in  Acts  15  : 
1-35  and  Paul  has  a  sketch  of.  the  private 
aspects  of  the  controversy  in  Galatians  2 : 
i-io.  Mark  was  undoubtedly  a  spectator 
of  what  was  going  on  in  Jerusalem  and  had 
his  own  point  of  view  about  it  all.  But,  alas, 
instead  of  being  in  the  thick  of  it  with  Paul 
and  Barnabas,  as  he  might  have  been,  he  is 
now  an  outsider.  There  must  have  been 
some  bitterness  of  spirit  as  Mark  saw  the 
fresh  honors  coming  to  the  leaders  whom  he 
had  deserted  at  Perga.  No  honor  came  to 
Mark. 

a.     Sympathy  with  the  Judaizers. 

It  is  almost  certain  that  Mark  had  a  re- 
action of  feeling  from  Paul  to  Peter,  as  he 
understood  Peter,  when  the  controversy 
started.  Everybody  was  taking  sides.  The 
Pharisaic  party  in  the  Jerusalem  church 
(Acts  11:2;  15 :  I  f.)  felt  certain  that  Peter 
and  James  would  take  their  side  against 
Paul.  It  is  hardly  proper  to  say  that  Mark 
aligned  himself  openly  with  the  Judaizers  for 


THEOWN  OUT  OF  WOEK  73 

Paul  calls  them  "  false  brethren "  (Gal.  2 : 4) 
and  Barnabas  stood  with  Paul  and  that  fact 
would  have  a  restraining  influence  on  Mark. 
But  many  a  minister,  who  has  been  tempo- 
rarily thrown  out  of  work,  has  had  the  tempta- 
tion to  bitterness  of  spirit  and  sourness  of 
disposition  that  finds  expression  in  unpleasant 
remarks  about  other  ministers.  The  man 
who  is  "  down  and  out  '*  easily  becomes  a 
"  knocker  "  against  the  man  who  is  still  at 
work.  The  keenest  critic  is  the  one  who  is 
doing  nothing  else.  The  man  who  becomes 
an  incarnate  sneer  toward  his  brethren  will 
find  it  hard  to  be  just.  It  would  be  easy  for 
Mark  to  find  ample  justification  for  his  own 
withdrawal  from  the  Gentile  propaganda  of 
Paul  in  the  ugly  things  that  the  Judaizers 
were  saying,  things  that  Mark  would  not  say 
himself,  but  which  he  probably  took  no  pains 
to  contradict.  He  could  at  least  point  to  the 
strife  that  had  been  caused  and  that  could  have 
been  avoided  by  a  more  moderate  and  cau- 
tious campaign.  Perhaps  he  could  say,  "  I 
told  you  so." 

3.     Silenced  by  Victory. 

But  victory  has   a  quieting  effect  upon 


74      MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

many  people.  The  noise  of  the  Judaizers 
was  great  at  the  start  (Acts  15  :  5)»  but  Peter 
and  even  James  had  championed  the  cause 
of  Gentile  freedom  as  expounded  by  Paul 
and  Barnabas  (15  :  7-21)  and  in  the  end  the 
vote  in  favor  of  the  resolution  by  James,  the 
president  of  the  conference,  was  unanimous 
(15  :  22),  the  Judaizers  themselves  probably 
not  voting  when  they  saw  that  they  were  in 
a  hopeless  minority.  For  the  second  time, 
therefore,  the  Judaizers  were  silenced  ;  once 
in  the  arraignment  of  Simon  Peter  (11  :  18)  to 
which  event  Peter  skillfully  referred  in  his 
speech  for  Paul  (15  :  7),  and  now  in  the 
triumph  of  Paul  and  Barnabas.  They  are 
sullen  and  sulk  in  their  tents  and  wait  for  an- 
other occasion  to  renew  the  strife.  Men  of 
this  type  will  not  keep  the  spirit  of  an  agree- 
ment. Documents  and  "decrees"  (Acts  16:4) 
are  mere  "  scraps  of  paper "  in  their  eyes 
when  they  are  bent  on  carrying  their  point 
in  the  end.  But,  no  doubt,  Mark  was  duly 
impressed  by  the  victory  of  Paul  and  Barna- 
bas. Mark  was  bound  to  review  the  whole 
situation  in  the  light  of  the  new  developments. 
Since  the  policy  of  the  whole  of  Christendom 
was  now  settled  on  the  question  of  the  freedom 


THEOWN  OUT  OF  WOEK  75 

of  the  Gentiles  from  Jewish  ceremonialism, 
Mark's  opposition  was  probably  gone.  The 
question  was  at  least  settled  and  he  was  ready 
to  join  in  the  work  again.  "  The  remon- 
strance of  Barnabas  may  have  brought  him 
to  a  sense  of  his  previous  misconduct" 
(Furneaux,  "Acts/'  p.  250).  Thus  Mark's 
prejudices  may  have  vanished. 

4.     In  Antioch  Again. 

At  any  rate  we  see  Mark  in  Antioch  again 
and  with  Barnabas.  It  is  not  quite  clear  on 
what  basis  he  came.  He  may  have  come  up 
with  Simon  Peter  whose  visit  to  Antioch  led 
to  the  unfortunate  episode  which  Paul  relates 
in  Galatians  2:11-21.  This  visit  of  Peter 
was  apparently  after  the  Jerusalem  conference, 
though  Ramsay  makes  it  before,  and  the 
same  as  the  visit  of  the  Judaizers  in  Acts 
15  :  I  ("St.  Paul  the  Traveller,"  p.  158).  If 
we  take  Galatians  2  :  i-io  to  refer  to  the 
same  meeting  as  Acts  15  : 4-29,  we  have  to 
put  Peter's  visit  later.  So  we  can  imagine 
Peter  in  Antioch  with  Paul  and  Barnabas  after 
the  great  victory  in  Jerusalem.  Peter  "ate 
with  the  Gentiles"  (Gal.  2  :  12)  as  he  was  ac- 
cused by  the  Pharisaic  Christians  of  doing  at 


76     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

Caesarea  (Acts  1 1 : 3).  The  question  of  social 
relations  did  not  come  up  in  the  Jerusalem 
conference  and  the  "  certain "  ones  from  Je- 
rusalem "from  James"  claimed  that  Peter 
had  gone  beyond  that  agreement  and  that 
James  would  not  approve  this  step  of  Peter. 
It  is  even  possible  that  Mark  was  one  of  these 
"  certain  "  ones,  but  not  likely.  Peter,  how- 
ever, was  so  much  impressed  by  them,  "  fear- 
ing them  of  the  circumcision,"  that  he  recanted 
and  changed  his  conduct  to  the  disgust  and 
the  indignation  of  Paul  who  "  resisted  him  to 
the  face  "  *'  before  them  all."  Certainly  Paul 
did  not  regard  Peter  as  the  Pope.  The  worst 
of  it  was  that  "  the  rest  of  the  Jews  dissem- 
bled likewise  with  him,  insomuch  that  even 
Barnabas  was  carried  away  by  their  dissimu- 
lation" (Gal.  2  :  13).  Paul  used  a  hard  word 
"  hypocrisy  "  ^  to  describe  this  conduct  of 
Peter  and  "  even  Barnabas."  Et  tu,  Brute. 
How  did  Barnabas  come  to  waver  and  to  de- 
sert Paul  after  all  their  struggles  together  and 
after  their  recent  victory  in  Jerusalem  and 
after  the  joyful  ratification  in  Antioch  (Acts 
15:31)?  The  most  plausible  explanation  is 
John  Mark's  influence  on  Barnabas,  who  may 

*  T^  vTioRpiati, 


THEOWN  OUT  OF  WORK  77 

have  persuaded  him  that  James  really  was 
opposed  to  the  social  equality  between  Greek 
and  Jewish  Christians  which  was  practiced  at 
Antioch  and  which  Paul  and  Barnabas  had 
also  practiced  on  their  recent  tour.  The  de- 
fection of  Peter  and  all  the  other  Jewish  Chris- 
tians in  Antioch  left  Barnabas  and  Paul  alone 
on  this  point.  Example  is  powerful  upon 
most  of  us.  So  Barnabas  stepped  over  to  the 
side  of  Peter  and  left  Paul  alone,  Paulus  contra 
mundum.  At  last  Barnabas  had  renounced 
Paul's  leadership  to  the  joy  of  John  Mark. 

5.    Won  Back  to  Paul. 

Paul  is  silent  about  Mark.  Luke  does  not 
say  how  it  was  done.  But  it  is  evident  that 
Paul  won  Peter  and  Barnabas  quickly  to  his 
view  again.  The  breach  was  momentary 
and  was  soon  healed.  It  was  all  a  mistake 
about  James  and  Mark  is  brought  once  again 
to  feel  kindly  toward  Paul.  It  is  not  likely 
that  Paul  was  told  if  there  was  any  change  in 
the  feeling  of  Mark  in  the  matter,  but  we 
know  that  Mark  was  willing  to  cooperate 
with  Paul  again  for  he  allows  Barnabas  to 
mention  the  matter  to  Paul.  This  speaks 
well  for  Mark  and  shows  that  he  had  not  be- 


78     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

come  wholly  embittered  by  what  had  oc- 
curred. Mark  had  probably  never  said  that 
he  would  not  work  again  with  Paul.  If  he 
had  said  it,  he  took  it  back.  A  man  can 
always  do  that  if  he  is  a  real  man.  It  is  a  lit- 
tle man  who  can  never  unsay  what  he  has 
said  that  is  wrong,  who  is  the  slave  of  con- 
sistency and  of  his  own  mistakes.  It  is  never 
too  late  to  mend  and  to  own  that  one  was 
wrong. 

6.    Renominated  by  Barnabas. 

It  is  almost  certain  that  Mark  was  taken 
along  in  the  first  tour  on  the  initiative  of 
Barnabas.  The  wound  was  soon  healed,  as 
has  been  said,  between  Paul  and  Barnabas 
who  was  a  generous  soul  and  who  really 
loved  Paul.  The  spirit  of  Paul  ere  long 
yearned  to  go  back  to  the  work.  He  longed 
to  see  again  the  faces  of  the  brethren  and 
sisters  who  had  been  won  to  Christ  in  the 
first  tour  (Acts  15  :  36).  So  Paul  made  a 
formal  offer  to  Barnabas  that  they  two  go 
out  again  on  a  second  tour  among  the  Gen- 
tiles. It  was  only  fitting  that  these  two  men 
should  go  together  again.  Barnabas  was 
more  than  willing,  only  "  he  was  minded  to 


THROWN  OUT  OF  WOEK  79 

take  with  them  John  also,  who  was  called 
Mark."  Once  again,  then,  Barnabas  pro- 
posed Mark.  Paul  had  not  asked  for  Mark. 
It  is  always  a  delicate  matter,  this  thing  of 
proposing  the  right  man  for  a  certain  task. 
Somebody  has  to  do  the  work.  Somebody 
has  to  nominate  men  for  work  in  church, 
state,  school,  business.  But  it  is  not  an  easy 
thing  to  do  wisely.  Plenty  of  men  "are 
mentioned,"  but  few  can  really  measure  up 
to  the  highest  places.  The  attitude  of  pulpit 
committees  before  a  call  is  extended  to  a 
pastor  and  afterwards  is  very  remarkable. 
So,  now  and  then,  a  preacher  is  found  who 
is  eager  to  step  into  the  highest  place  whether 
desired  or  not.  But  it  is  not  hard  to  read 
between  the  lines  here  and  to  see  that  Mark 
had  not  been  happy  since  he  left  Perga. 
There  are  few  sadder  things  than  the  min- 
ister who  feels  called  to  preach  and  yet 
nobody  seems  called  to  listen  to  him.  He 
seems  a  ministerial  misfit  and  is  not  expected 
to  go  into  business.  But  he  must  make  an 
honest  living.  Paul  had  no  such  clerical 
scruples  as  we  have  to-day.  He  resolutely 
made  his  own  living  by  his  trade  with  his 
own  hands  and  refused  to  starve  because  a 


80     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

church  like  that  at  Corinth  would  not  pay  for 
his  work.  Paul  had  the  world  before  him 
and,  when  persecuted  in  one  city,  he  went 
on  to  the  next.  To-day  we  have,  in  self- 
defense,  to  know  a  man's  antecedents  if  he 
comes  as  a  stranger  before  we  dare  open  our 
churches  to  him.  This  is  one  of  the  draw- 
backs of  work  in  a  highly  organized  Chris- 
tianity. But  Barnabas  boldly  championed 
the  cause  of  John  Mark  and  made  it  his  own. 
He  wanted  to  give  him  another  trial.  Prob- 
ably Mark  *'  was  prepared  to  promise  greater 
perseverance"  (Furneaux,  "Acts,"  p.  250). 
It  was  necessary  that  Mark  be  reinstated 
somehow  and  get  on  his  feet  again.  He  had 
made  a  great  mistake.  But  was  he  to  be 
damned  forever  for  that?  Who  does  not 
sometimes  make  a  mistake?  We  can  im- 
agine how  the  mind  of  Barnabas  worked  in 
a  truly  sympathetic  vein  as  he  plead  the 
cause  of  Mark.  Our  hearts  are  with  Bar- 
nabas in  this  plea  as  they  go  out  to  every 
young  minister  who  stumbles  and  tries  to 
get  up  'again  and  to  go  on  in  the  work  to 
which  he  feels  called.  There  was  Peter  him- 
self, a  man  of  impulse  and  of  power.  Jesus 
forgave  Peter  and  sent  a  special  message  of 


THEOWN  OUT  OF  WOEK  81 

reinstatement  to  him  and  made  him  chief 
spokesman  at  Pentecost.  Peter  had  fallen 
and  Christ  had  raised  him  up.  Mark  de- 
served to  be  given  a  new  opportunity  and 
Barnabas  was  the  man  to  help  him.  Had 
not  Barnabas  befriended  Paul  when  he  was 
distrusted  by  all  the  saints  in  Jerusalem? 
Paul  was  under  great  obligations  to  Bar- 
nabas who  had  also  brought  him  to  Antioch 
and  had  thus  given  him  his  great  oppor- 
tunity for  service.  How  could  Paul  resist 
such  a  plea  from  Barnabas  ? 


VI 

TURNED  DOWN  BY  PAUL 

*'  But  Paul  thought  not  good  to  take  with  them  him 
who  withdrew  from  them  from  Pamphyliat  and 
went  not  with  them  to  the  work^ — Acts  15  :  38. 


VI 

TURNED  DOWN  BY  PAUL 

I.     Paul's  Surprise  at  Barnabas. 

IT  was  Barnabas  who  had  proposed  Mark 
for  the  first  tour  which  led  to  the  sad 
defection  at  Perga.  And  now  Barnabas 
was  suggesting  his  cousin  again.  It  looked 
to  Paul  like  nepotism.  Partiality  to  relatives 
in  posts  of  responsibility  is  not  relished  by 
the  public  in  church  or  state  affairs  (Stalker, 
"  The  Life  of  St.  Paul,"  p.  119).  And  Barna- 
bas insisted^  on  taking  John  Mark  "also," 
as  Luke  vividly  describes  it.  Paul  had  be- 
come accustomed  to  the  leadership  by  now 
and  this  sudden  independence  on  the  part  of 
Barnabas  came  as  a  jolt.  "  It  may  even  be 
that  Barnabas,  after  finding  himself  once 
more  in  the  old  place  of  high  consideration 
at  Jerusalem  was  beginning  to  feel  his 
secondary  position  at  Antioch,  and  resented 

H^oOXsTo  imperfect  tense  (continued  action). 
8s 


86     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

Paul's  determination  to  have  his  own  way  " 
(Furneaux,  "  Acts,"  pp.  25of.).  Barnabas 
probably  felt  also  that  it  was  unjust  to  ruin 
the  career  of  a  young  man  like  Mark  because 
of  a  mistake  of  which  he  was  now  sincerely 
sorry.  But  Paul  could  retort  that  this  good- 
ness of  Barnabas  to  John  Mark  was  in  fact 
nothing  but  good-natured  weakness  Qohnston, 
"  St.  Paul  and  His  Mission  to  the  Roman 
Empire,"  p.  99).  Paul  probably  felt  also  that 
Barnabas  was  presuming  on  their  old  and 
tried  friendship  in  pressing  Mark  upon  him 
and  so  stood  his  ground.^  He  felt  (Hackett, 
"  Acts,"  p.  179)  that  Barnabas  was  influenced 
more  by  his  feelings  than  by  his  judgment. 
And  yet  Paul  esteemed  Barnabas  very  highly. 
It  was  just  this  love  for  Barnabas  that  hurt 
him  so  when  the  cleavage  came.  At  the 
time  of  the  temporary  defection  of  Peter  and 
Barnabas  Paul  said,  "  even  Barnabas,"  strong 
proof  of  his  high  esteem  (Lightfoot,  on 
Galatians  2 :  13). 

2.     Indignation  at  Mark. 
As  we  have  seen,  the  recent  conduct  of 
Mark   had   stirred  again  Paul's   resentment 

*  i^^tou.     Imperfect  against  imperfecr  (^^^ouXero). 


TUENED  DOWN  BY  PAUL  87 

toward  him  for  his  desertion  at  Perga.  He 
had  certainly  stood  with  Peter  and  Barnabas 
and  the  rest  of  the  Jews  against  Paul  at 
Antioch.  He  had  probably  sympathized  at 
first  with  the  Judaizers  and  Paul  was  dis- 
tinctly prejudiced  against  him.  "  Paul 
deemed  it  worth  while  or  proper  not  to  be 
taking  along  this  fellow,  the  one  who  aposta- 
tized from  them  from  Pamphylia  and  did  not 
go  with  them  to  the  work."  This  is  a  literal 
translation  of  Luke's  language  about  Paul.^ 
Paul  thought  of  the  misery  of  having  this 
deserter  (apostate  ^)  from  his  friends,  though 
not  from  Christ,  hanging  around  all  the  time 
and  liable  to  prove  fickle  again  and  to  quit, 
this  fellow  who  would  not  stick  to  the  work 
and  left  his  co-workers  in  the  lurch  in  the 
pinch  at  Perga.  John  took  his  hand  from 
the  plow  and  was  not  worthy  to  be  entrusted 
with  that  plow  again.  Evidentiy  Paul  was 
not  sure  of  Mark's  real  sympathy  with  the 
Gentile  propaganda.  He  might  fly  off  the 
handle  again   and   greatly  embarrass   Paul 


*  Barnabas  is  pictured  as  proposing  (ruuTtapaXa^eiu 
(aorist,  punctiliar)  while  Paul  speaks  of  it  as  ffuvizapaXap." 
^dvetv  (present,  linear). 


88     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

with  the  churches  in  South  Galatia.  "  He 
could  not  trust  a  stafE  which  had  once  broken 
in  his  hand"  (Furneaux,  "Acts,"  p.  252). 
Mark  had  been  disloyal  to  the  mission 
among  the  Gentiles.  Paul  could  base  his 
opposition,  therefore,  on  the  interests  of  the 
cause  rather  than  on  his  own  personal  likes 
and  dislikes.  If  Mark  went  along  and  was 
once  more  unfaithful,  Paul  would  hold  Barna- 
bas doubly  responsible. 

3.  Sharp  Contention  Between  Paul  and 
Barnabas. 

The  word  employed  by  Luke  is  our  very 
word  "  paroxysm."  ^  Probably  neither  meant 
the  thing  to  go  that  far,  but  suppressed  emo- 
tion and  hitherto  unexpressed  convictions  now 
came  to  the  surface.  The  gentle  Barnabas, 
son  of  consolation,  was  now  violent  in  a  dis- 
pute. Paul  may  have  chided  him  with  being 
too  tolerant  of  faint-hearted ness  (Pressense, 
"The  Early  Years  of  Christianity,"  p.  113). 
He  could  now  retort  that  Paul  was  too  hard- 
hearted and  unsympathetic.  "The  smaller 
rubs  of  life  often  try  the  temper  more  than 

*  napo^ufffxos:.  '0^o(:  means  **  sharp  "  like  vinegar  and 
d^vvu)  to  make  sharp  and  -napd  intensifies  the  idea. 


TURNED  DOWK  BY  PAUL  89 

the  greater  things,  and  they  find  us  with  our 
armor  ofE "  (Furneaux,  *'  Acts  "  p.  250).  Paul 
may  have  wondered  how  Barnabas  really  felt 
about  his  leadership.  The  wound  seemed 
healed  after  his  rebuke  of  Peter  and  Barnabas, 
but  it  is  easy  to  open  an  old  sore.  Perhaps 
after  all  Barnabas  was  not  willing  to  go 
whole-heartedly  and  to  the  logical  conclusion 
with  Paul  in  the  mission  work  among  the 
Gentiles.  Luke  does  not  hesitate  to  reveal 
the  sad  fact  of  the  bitterness  between  these 
two  old  friends  about  John  Mark,  but  he  does 
not  preserve  the  sharp  words  used  by  either 
Paul  or  Barnabas.  It  is  just  as  well  not  to 
know  them.  Probably  both  men  deeply  re- 
gretted some  things  that  they  said,  however 
true  they  were.  It  is  not  necessary  to  decide 
who  was  right  in  the  controversy.  There 
was  undoubtedly  right  on  both  sides.  There 
is  no  way  to  settle  our  likes  and  dislikes  about 
persons.  The  only  way  out  is  to  agree  to 
disagree.  It  is  partly  temperament  and  it  is 
well  that  people  do  differ  so. 

4.     Separation  Between  Paul  and  Barnabas. 

It  is  sad  to  see  these  great  apostles  of  the 

Gentiles   part.     Furneaux   ("Acts,"   p.  252) 


90     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTBY 

thinks  that  they  may  have  known  each  other 
as  fellow  students  at  Tarsus.  Certainly  their 
lives  had  been  strangely  linked  together  and 
each  had  done  much  for  the  other.  Barnabas 
had  been  Paul's  best  friend  among  the  Chris- 
tians and  had  championed  his  sincerity  from 
the  start  (Acts  9  :  27)  and  had  faced  with  him 
the  perils  of  rivers  and  of  robbers  from  which 
John  Mark  shrank.  He  had  shared  Paul's 
perils  with  the  heathen  and  had  fought  by  his 
side  against  the  false  brethren  who  had  tried 
to  undo  his  world-work.  And  now  they  must 
part.  These  two  men  were  the  outstanding 
figures  in  the  mission  work  of  the  early  Chris- 
tians. The  worst  of  it  was  that  they  parked 
in  anger.  If  Paul  was  parting  from  his  chief 
benefactor,  Barnabas  was  leaving  the  fore- 
most spirit  of  his  time  (Stalker,  **  The  Life  of 
St.  Paul,"  p.  120).  "They  parted  asunder 
from  one  another."  ^  They  never  worked  to- 
gether again  and,  so  far  as  we  know,  never 
met  again.  The  breach  was  later  healed,  we 
may  be  sure,  for  Paul  speaks  kindly  of  Barna- 
bas in  I  Corinthians  9 : 6,  and  Colossians 
4:10.  We  may  be  sure  that  Paul  felt  a  keen 
pang  over  this  parting  from  Barnabas.     Had 


TUENED  DOWN  BY  PAUL  91 

he  done  right  after  all  ?  Who  can  tell  ?  He 
will  later  say :  "  Love  is  not  provoked/'  * 
and  will  use  this  very  word  for  "  paroxysm." 
Will  he  be  thinking  of  his  sad  experience  by 
which  he  had  learned  this  truth  ?  In  Acts 
17  :  i6  Luke  uses  this  same  word  for  the 
provocation  of  Paul's  spirit  at  the  sight  of  so 
many  idols  in  Athens.  We  are  exhorted  in 
Hebrews  10  :  24  to  "  consider  one  another  for 
a  paroxysm  of  love  and  of  good  works,"  this 
word  again.  Provocation  may  be  to  good 
or  to  evil  and  God  can  overrule  the  evil  and 
turn  it  into  good.  At  any  rate  "  two  mission- 
ary bands  started  instead  of  one,  and  new 
workers  were  taken  into  the  field  "  (Rackham, 
"Acts,"  p.  261).  Barnabas  went  his  way  and 
Paul  went  his.  Luke  follows  the  fortunes  of 
Paul  and  Barnabas  drops  out  of  sight  in  Acts. 
The  so-called  Epistle  of  Barnabas  is  not  gen- 
uine. Some  consider  him  the  author  of  the 
Epistle  to  the  Hebrews.  Of  that  we  do  not 
know.  "We  part  from  the  honorable  and 
gracious  personality  of  Barnabas  with  deep 
regret;  but  history  marches  with  Paul" 
(Ramsay,  *'  Pictures  of  the  Apostolic  Church," 
p.  198). 

*  I  Corinthians  13:5  ou  napo^uyerat. 


92     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

5.  Paul  and  Silas. 

Silas  did  not  take  the  place  of  Mark,  but 
of  Barnabas.  Paul  felt  no  need  of  Mark  and 
had  no  place  for  him  and  chose  no  successor 
to  him.  Silas  had  been  sent  with  Judas 
from  Jerusalem  to  bear  the  Epistle  from  the 
Conference  to  the  church  in  Antioch  (Acts 
15-32).  Silas  is  an  abbreviation  for  Silvanus 
(i  Thess.  I :  I ;  2  Thess.  i :  i ;  2  Cor.  i :  19). 
Like  Paul,  he  was  a  Roman  citizen  (Acts 
16:37).  He  was  loyal  to  Paul  through  the 
second  tour  and  yet  was  on  intimate  terms 
with  Peter  (i  Pet.  5  :  12).  He  was  a  Hellen- 
istic Jew  like  Paul  and  a  worthy  successor  to 
Barnabas.  He  had  apparently  remained  in 
Antioch  after  coming  up  and  was  in  full  sym- 
pathy with  Paul's  views  of  work  among  the 
Gentiles.  The  sympathy  of  the  church  at 
Antioch  was  apparently  with  Paul  and  Silas 
as  they  start  upon  the  new  campaign,  *'  being 
commended  by  the  brethren  to  the  grace  of 
the  Lord ''  (Acts  15 :  40). 

6.  Mark's  Meditations. 

Barnabas  apparently  had  already  gone 
away  with  Mark  to  Cyprus.  Did  Mark  have 
no  compunctions  of  conscience  over  being 


TUEKED  DOWN  BY  PAUL  93 

the  occasion  of  this  cleavage  between  Paul 
and  Barnabas  ?     We  can  only  conjecture  his 
thoughts  as  he  sailed  away  with  Barnabas. 
Should    a   preacher  allow   a  church   to  be 
divided  over  him  ?     That  question  cannot  be 
easily  answered.    It  all  depends.    Jesus  Him- 
self has  brought  division  into  many  homes. 
He  brings  peace  beyond  all  understanding, 
but  sometimes  the  sword  comes  first.     But 
no  sincere  preacher  enjoys  being  a  bone  of 
contention  between  opposing  factions,  lea?t 
of  all  being  the  cause  of  bitterness  between 
the  closest  friends.     Many  a  preacher   has 
known  what  it  is  to  be  rejected  by  church 
committees  and  by  churches  themselves.     It 
is  not  a  pleasant  experience  to  be  a  candi- 
date for  a  vacant  pulpit  and  to  be  passed  by. 
Marcus  Dods  was  a  probationer  for  six  years 
after  he  graduated  at  New  College  before  he 
received  a  call  to  be  pastor.     Church  after 
church  invited  him  to  preach  and  then  re- 
jected him.     Such  an  experience  would  have 
embittered  the  spirit  of  a  narrow  man,  but 
Dods  utilized  these  years  to  make  a  scholar  of 
himself.     In  time  he  became  the  principal  of 
New  College  and  a  glory  to  Scotland.    Surely 
it  was  now  a  crisis  for  John  Mark.     It  is  not 


94     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

pleasant  to  be  a  ministerial  misfit.  But  one 
may  be  a  misfit  in  one  place  and  make  a  fit 
in  another.  Was  there  a  place  that  Mark 
would  suit?  He  had  apparently  lost  his 
chance  with  Paul.  He  had  lost  the  greatest 
opportunity.  Would  he  make  good  in  an- 
other sphere?  The  answer  lies  with  Mark 
himself.  The  preacher  who  is  always  look- 
ing to  his  friends  to  save  him  from  his  own 
mistakes  will  reach  the  end  of  his  tether. 


VII 

GIVEN  A  NEW  CHANCE  BY 
BARNABAS 

"  And  Barnabas  took  Mark  with  him,  and  sailed 
away  unto  Cyprus." — Acts  15 :  39. 


VII 

GIVEN  A  NEW  CHANCE  BY 
BARNABAS 

I.    The  Victim  of  Circumstances. 

SURELY  Mark  was  caught  in  the  toils 
of  circumstance  not  wholly  in  his  con- 
trol. At  college  we  used  to  debate 
whether  the  man  made  the  crisis  or  the  crisis 
the  man.  Certainly  there  is  an  element  of 
truth  in  both.  Man  is  not  a  mere  machine 
driven  by  blind  fate.  He  has  will  and  choice 
and  within  limits  is  the  arbiter  of  his  own 
career  and  makes  his  own  destiny.  An 
unstable  man  can  find  plenty  of  excuses  for 
his  own  fickleness  and  failures,  usually  in  the 
capricious  whims  of  other  people  and  the 
general  perversity  of  things.  Such  men  talk 
of  luck  and  blind  fate  and  not  of  pluck 
and  good  Providence.  It  is  too  much  to 
expect  that,  as  yet,  John  Mark  held  him- 
self responsible  for  what  had  happened  to 
him.  Other  men  have  had  like  difficulty  in 
97 


^8     MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

seeing  their  own  situation.  Pessimism  comes 
at  times  to  the  noblest  spirits.  Marcus  Dods 
was  mentioned  in  the  preceding  chapter  as  a 
noble  specimen  of  the  young  minister  who 
held  himself  to  the  highest  things  and  went 
on  with  his  studies,  though  the  churches 
would  not  have  him.  Some  found  this  fault 
with  him  and  some  that,  sometimes  directly 
contradictory  faults.  It  was  so  with  John 
the  Baptist  and  with  Jesus.  Marcus  Dods 
stuck  to  his  Greek  and  Hebrew  and  went  on 
learning  and  growing  till  his  day  should 
come.  It  was  long  in  coming  and  there 
were  dark  hours.  Toward  the  close  of  his 
six  years  of  probation  he  wrote  to  his  sister 
who  was  his  confidant  and  comfort :  "  I  am 
feeling  more  and  more  done,  and  if  this 
Glasgow  thing  comes  to  nothing,  I  don't  see 
why  or  how  I  am  to  hang  on  longer ;  phys- 
ically I  cannot  and  morally  and  spiritually 
I  have  been  done  long  ago.  I  never 
preached  better  than  at  Glasgow ;  it  is  a 
nice  church,  very,  but  only  about  i8o  people, 
so  that  each  might  have  had  a  pew.  This, 
of  course,  makes  the  idea  of  a  call  rather 
terrific,  as  how  could  I  ever  increase  them  ?" 
("  Early  Letters  of  Marcus  Dods,"  p.  i86). 


GIYEl^  A  NEW  CHANCE  99 

Then  later  he  writes  {ibid,,  p.  199)  that  "  Dr. 
Bonar  has  been  at  me  again,  not  for  Naples, 
but  for  Sydney.  He  tells  me  what  he  told 
me  before  that  Dr.  Mackay  there  wants  a 
colleague,  and  that  no  placed  minister  here 
who  is  fit  will  go."  Dods  began  to  examine 
himself  to  see  what  was  the  matter.  "  If  I 
could  get  a  man  to  put  warmth  into  me,  and 
utterance,  in  Paul's  sense,  I  would  deliver 
wonderfully.  But  it  vexes  me  all  the  more 
when  people  talk  of  my  delivery,  for  I  feel 
all  the  more  deeply  it  is  not  an  external  thing 
that  art  can  overcome,  but  my  nature  that  is 
not  a  preacher's  nature "  (ibid.,  p.  195). 
"  There  is  no  chance  henceforth  for  the  like 
of  me,  you  know,  and  what  I  say  to  myself 
I  say  also  to  you  "  {ibid,,  p.  293).  "  I  am  not 
so  envious,  I  think,  as  you  have  known 
me ;  it  comes  back  upon  me,  but  rather  as 
an  old  memory  than  as  a  present  habit" 
(ibid.,  p.  294).  And  yet  Marcus  Dods  be- 
came one  of  the  great  preachers  of  his 
day  and  a  teacher  of  preachers  who  has  left 
his  stamp  upon  a  whole  generation  of 
young  ministers.  Perga  had  once  overcome 
John  Mark.  Would  he  now  triumph  over 
Perga  ? 


100    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

2.    The  Duty  of  a  Kinsman. 

It  is  certain  that  Barnabas  felt  a  sort  of 
responsibility  for  the  success  of  John  Mark's 
ministry  that  Paul  did  not  share.  He  was 
his  kinsman  and  that  fact  did  impose  an 
extra  burden  upon  his  shoulders.  Paul  will 
later  refer  to  Mark  as  "  the  cousin  of  Barna- 
bas "  ^  (Col.  4 :  id)  in  a  way  that  "  reads  like 
a  fond  recollection  of  old  times  "  (Furneaux, 
"Acts,"  p.  252)  and  that  seems  partly  ex- 
planatory also  of  the  fact  that  Mark's  life 
had  been  more  closely  identified  with  that 
of  Barnabas  than  with  that  of  Paul.  Blood 
relationship  does  not  justify  favoritism,  but 
neither  does  it  absolve  one  from  his  peculiar 
obligations.  We  may  well  believe  that  Bar- 
nabas cherished  no  grudge  against  Paul  for 
what  he  considered  his  harsh,  even  unkind, 
treatment  of  Mark.  He  was  too  high-minded 
and  warm-hearted  a  man  to  nourish  resent- 
ment. The  world  was  wide  and  there  was 
work  enough  for  all  and  personal  prejudices 
must  not  be  allowed  to  sour  one's  temper. 
But,  all  the  same,  Paul's  scornful  rejection  of 
.Mark  as  a  co-worker  naturally  intensified  the 
devotion  of  Barnabas  to  his  protege  and  dis- 

*d  dv£<ptdi  Bapvd^a, 


GIVEN  A  NEW  CHANCE  101 

ciple.  He  at  least  must  do  his  part  by  Mark 
and  see  to  it  that  he  has  another  chance  in 
which  to  redeem  himself  and  show  that  he 
could  make  good  after  all,  that  he  had  the 
stuff  of  manhood  in  him.  It  must  be  ad- 
mitted that  kinspeople  do  not  always  stand 
by  one  when  he  is  down  and  out.  Too  often 
they  are  the  severest  critics  of  all  and  do 
least  to  set  one  on  his  feet  again.  A  sense 
of  mortification  ofttimes  makes  one's  kins- 
people  really  unkind  and  unduly  hard.  It 
must  be  confessed  that  one  can  strain  to  the 
snapping  point  the  chords  of  love  and  yet 
blood  is  blood  and  love  is  love.  Blessings 
be  upon  Barnabas,  the  man  of  heart,  who 
was  unwilling  to  throw  to  the  scrap-heap 
this  fine  young  minister  without  one  more 
trial.  Barnabas  could  at  least  feel  that  he 
had  done  his  duty  by  John  Mark.  The  min- 
ister who  has  failed  is  taboo  with  many 
churches  and  preachers.  The  excuses  may 
be  excellent,  but  nothing  succeeds  like  suc- 
cess and  nothing  fails  like  failure.  In  war 
the  general  who  loses  a  campaign  loses  also 
his  official  head.  We  are  all  willing  for  peo- 
ple to  learn  how  to  rectify  their  mistakes, 
provided  they  do  their  learning  upon  some- 


102    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

body  else.  An  old  preacher  requires  some- 
thing of  a  mother's  love  and  tender  patience 
to  deal  with  the  crudities  of  youth  and  the 
clinging  tendrils  of  young  hearts  that  reach 
out  after  the  sturdy  oak  by  which  to  climb. 
One  must  not  victimize  other  churches  just 
to  help  a  kinsman  get  a  start.  A  delicate 
sense  of  loyalty  to  the  cause  of  Christ  is 
involved  as  well  as  the  desire  to  be  of  service 
to  a  young  minister  who  has  missed  the  path 
of  usefulness. 

3.    Sympathy  with  the  Weaker  Brother. 

Mark's  conduct  at  Perga  probably  did  not 
appear  to  Barnabas  in  the  light  of  a  deser- 
tion. We  go  in  the  end  of  the  day  by  the 
bent  of  our  natures.  Joseph  was  nicknamed 
(surnamed)  Barnabas  by  the  apostles  because 
of  his  great  generosity.  He  sold  a  field  in 
the  hour  of  need  in  Jerusalem  and  laid  the 
money  at  the  feet  of  the  apostles  (Acts  4: 
36  f.).  That  soubriquet,  son  of  consolation, 
supplanted  the  name  of  Joseph  just  as  Cephas 
or  Peter  did  that  of  Simon.  He  lived  up  to 
his  surname  and  never  appears  to  better 
advantage  than  when  he  is  befriending  a 
brother  in  trouble.     "  We  must  never  forget 


GIVEN  A  NEW  CHANCE  103 

that  twice  over  did  Barnabas  save  Saul  for 
the  work  of  Christianity  "  (Knowling,  "Acts," 
p.  331).  As  he  had  befriended  Saul  when 
he  had  no  friends  in  Jerusalem,  so  he  now 
takes  John  Mark  under  his  protecting  care. 
"  Barnabas  took  ^  Mark  with  him  and  sailed 
away  unto  Cyprus."  This  was  an  act  of 
courage  and  of  kindness  of  heart  that  was 
wholly  in  keeping  with  the  generous  nature 
of  Barnabas.  Paul  and  Barnabas  said  to  the 
men  of  Lystra  who  tried  to  worship  them  as 
Mercury  and  Jupiter :  "  We  are  men  of  like 
nature  with  you"  (Acts  14:15).  The  milk 
of  human  kindness  was  abundant  in  the 
heart  of  Barnabas.  After  all  is  said,  there 
is  nothing  that  will  take  the  place  of  sym- 
pathy in  a  preacher.  This  is  true,  of  course, 
in  his  preaching.  Broadus  used  to  say  that, 
as  Demosthenes  stressed  "  action,  action,  ac- 
tion "  as  the  three  most  important  things  in 
the  speaker,  so  he  would  emphasize  "sym- 
pathy, sympathy,  sympathy "  as  the  three 
prime  requisites  in  the  preacher  of  the  Gos- 
pel. This  is  true  of  the  pastoral  side  also. 
The  shepherd  heart  is  vital  to  the  pastor. 
People  must  know  that  the  pastor  takes  his 

*  T:apa).a^6vra  took  along. 


104    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

place  by  their  side  as  well  as  at  their  head. 
The  captain  who  will  go  over  the  top  with 
his  men  can  lead  them  anywhere.  Jesus  is 
the  only  perfect  man.  In  the  Gospels  the 
weaknesses  of  the  disciples  stand  out  in  bold 
outline.  We  are  all  sinners.  "We  are  all 
poor  critters,"  Dr.  Arthur  Peter  of  Louisville, 
one  of  God's  noblemen,  used  to  say.  There 
was  no  posing  as  perfect  on  the  part  of  either 
Paul  or  Barnabas  (Macdufi,  "The  Footsteps 
of  St.  Paul,"  p.  157).  Paul  was  only  "a  min- 
ister, a  servant,  a  slave  of  Christ."  Paul 
knew  how  to  help  other  ministers.  No  other 
minister  save  Jesus  our  Lord  has  ever  stim- 
ulated and  stirred  to  the  highest  things  min- 
isters of  the  Gospel  as  has  Paul  of  Tarsus. 
He  was  also  a  man  of  great  heart  and  deep 
emotion.  But  in  the  case  of  John  Mark  it  is 
Barnabas  who  shows  the  touch  of  nature  that 
makes  the  whole  world  kin. 

4.  Barnabas  Able  Now  to  Tell  Mark  His 
Fault. 

That  is  always  a  most  delicate  thing  to 
do.  If  done  unwisely,  the  work  of  correction 
may  do  more  harm  than  good.  The  wound 
may  be  made  deeper  and  may  heal  more 


GIVEN"  A  NEW  CHANCE  105 

slowly.  And  yet  a  skillful  surgeon  will 
cleanse  the  wound  of  all  impurities  so  that 
it  will  heal.  The  probing  may  hurt  for  the 
moment  We  may  trust  Barnabas  for  this 
part  of  the  discipline  of  Mark.  We  may  be 
sure  that  Barnabas  would  not  make  a  hero 
or  a  martyr  of  Mark  and  allow  him  to  nurse 
his  grievance  against  Paul  to  the  neglect  of  a 
vision  of  his  own  shortcoming.  The  parent 
has  to  walk  this  narrow  path  every  day  with 
the  children  and  makes  mistakes  enough, 
now  one  way,  now  the  other.  The  teacher 
finds  it  hard  to  strike  the  balance  correctly, 
to  praise  properly  and  to  correct  discreetly. 
The  school  of  experience  is  the  one  where 
all  of  us  have  to  learn  lessons  that  we  will 
not  or  cannot  learn  elsewhere. 

5.    Learning  by  Mistakes. 

Suffering  plays  a  large  part  in  all  of  the 
soul's  progress.  It  pleased  God,  **  in  bring- 
ing many  sons  unto  glory,  to  make  the  author 
of  their  salvation  perfect  through  suflFering  " 
(Heb.  2  :  10).  This  great  passage  dignifies 
humanity  and  ennobles  suffering  as  a  means 
of  teaching  our  souls  the  ways  of  God.  Jesus 
had  to  live  His  human  life  before  He  could 


106    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

have  the  wealth  of  sympathy  that  gave  Him 
power  to  succor  the  tempted  (Heb.  2 :  18). 
The  preacher  has  to  tread  the  same  road. 
Disappointment  lies  in  his  path.  It  is  never 
too  late  to  mend,  if  one  will  learn  his  lesson 
and  learn  to  make  the  mistakes  of  his  life 
stepping-stones  to  higher  things.  But  one 
must  first  see  one's  error  and  acknowledge 
it  as  an  error  and  resolve  to  change  one's  con- 
duct. Fickleness  will  ruin  the  career  of  any 
man.  A  rolling  stone  gathers  no  moss,  we 
say.  It  is  clear  from  the  sequel  that  Mark 
learned  his  lesson  from  Barnabas  who  proved 
a  wise  and  loving  teacher. 

6.    The  Last  Glimpse  of  Barnabas. 

Back  in  Cyprus  Barnabas  was  in  his  old 
home  and  Mark  in  that  of  his  family.  Ram- 
say ("  Pictures  of  the  Apostolic  Church,"  p. 
198)  says  that  Barnabas  "went  away  into  the 
backwater  of  Cyprus  and  passes  out  of  his- 
tory." That  is  a  rather  curt  way  to  dismiss 
Barnabas  and  Mark.  Luke  traced  the  for- 
tunes of  Paul  who  was  undoubtedly  a  greater 
man  than  Barnabas  or  Mark.  Barnabas  had 
no  biographer  and  wrote  no  letters  that  have 
been  preserved.     Clearly  Luke  did  not  esti- 


GIVEN  A  NEW  CHANCE  107 

mate  the  work  of  Barnabas  in  the  same 
category  as  that  of  Paul  in  the  development 
of  Christianity  (Knowling,  "  Acts,"  p.  331). 
But  Barnabas  was  not  a  negligible  factor  up 
to  this  period,  Luke  himself  being  witness. 
Indeed,  he  is  distinctly  one  of  the  great 
figures  in  the  early  days  of  Christianity,  up 
to  the  close  of  Acts  15.  There  is  no  reason 
to  think  that  Barnabas  was  idle  or  in  a  sulk 
because  of  his  separation  from  Paul.  The 
tradition  is  that  he  died  in  Cyprus.  He 
was  an  older  man  than  Paul.  The  bulk  of 
his  work  was  probably  already  behind  him, 
while  Paul  was  now  in  his  prime.  Barnabas 
had  done  enough  to  make  his  name  immortal. 
In  Cyprus  he  was  with  old  friends  and  he 
could  confirm  and  consolidate  the  work  al- 
ready done  there.  He  did  not  die  right 
away  because  he  is  apparently  still  at  work 
when  Paul  writes  i  Corinthians  (9:6).  He 
and  Paul  are  still  friends.  If  Barnabas  had 
done  nothing  further  during  these  years  but 
save  Mark,  he  would  have  accomplished  a 
great  work.  The  old  preacher  finds  his 
chief  joy  in  the  fresh  glow  of  enthusiasm  of 
the  young  servant  of  Christ.  Thus  men  die 
and  the  work  goes  on.     Mark  would  not  be 


108    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTET 

an  apprentice  always.  His  days  of  probation 
were  over.  If  he  was  ever  to  accomplish 
anything  worth  while,  he  must  be  at  it. 
Some  men  develop  more  slowly  than  others. 
The  infant  prodigies  are  not  always  giants  as 
adults.  Some  of  those  who  ripen  slowly  are 
like  oaks  when  grown  to  maturity.  Mark 
had  his  gifts,  though  not  of  the  very  highest 
order,  yet  real  and  worth  using  to  the  full. 
Will  he  come  to  himself,  get  a  grip  on  his 
powers,  and  get  down  to  "  brass-tacks,"  as 
we  say?  If  so,  he  must  be  up  and  doing. 
He  cannot  spend  all  his  days  under  the 
shadow  of  Barnabas'  wing.  The  only  way 
to  preach  is  to  preach.  The  only  way  to 
work  is  to  work.  Nothing  will  take  the  place 
of  steady  application.  John  D.  Rockefeller 
gives  "  stick-to-ativeness "  as  one  of  the 
great  rules  of  success  in  life.  That  rule  ap- 
plies to  the  ministry  as  to  all  other  occupa- 
tions. The  touch-and-go  preacher  will  leave 
little  result  when  he  goes.  If  one  has  to 
apologize  always  for  the  preacher's  mistakes, 
he  will  by  and  by  grow  weary.  The  positive 
side  of  the  scales  must  make  a  showing  else 
one  will  be  weighed  in  the  balances  and 
found  wanting. 


VIII 
PETER'S  SON  AND  INTERPRETER 

^*  Mark  my  son.*' — i  Peter  5  :  13. 
**Markt   having  become  the   interpreter  of  Peter!* 
— Papias,  quoted  in  Eusebius,  H.  E.  III.  39. 


VIII 

PETER'S  SON  AND  INTERPRETER 

I.     One  of  Peter's  Converts. 

THIS  is  a  natural  meaning  of  Peter's 
language  •*  my  son,"  though  not 
necessarily  so.  Spiritual  relationship 
of  this  kind  is  usually  expressed  by  another 
word  ^  in  Paul's  Epistles  (Swete,  *'  Com- 
mentary," p.  xvi).  Still,  it  is  quite  possible 
that  Peter  employed  this  word  in  the  sense 
of  spiritual  sonship.  We  know  that  Peter 
was  a  welcome  visitor  to  the  house  of  Mary 
and  he  was  probably  the  instrument  of  their 
conversion  to  Christ.  It  is  curious  to  find 
McGiffert  ^  ascribing  i  Peter  to  Barnabas  be- 
cause of  this  affectionate  designation  of  John 
Mark.  Surely  Peter  loved  his  converts  as 
tenderly  as  did  Paul.    Nothing  is  more  natural 

^ri/zvov    (i    Cor.   4:7;    Phil.    2:22;    I  Tim.    1:2; 
Titus  I  :  4,  etc.),  whereas  Peter  uses  u\6<;. 

' "  History    of  Christianity   in    the    Apostolic   Age," 
pp.  599  f. 

Ill 


112    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

than  that  Mark  should  be  with  Peter  again  if 
Peter  was  his  spiritual  father.  It  is  not 
necessary  to  suppose  that  Mark  remained 
with  Barnabas  till  his  death  if  Peter  needed 
him  and  Barnabas  had  no  further  need  of  his 
services.  He  probably  had  already  been 
one  of  Peter's  pupils  and  Peter  was  only  too 
glad  to  have  his  former  disciple  with  him 
again,  "  who  as  a  young  disciple  must  often 
have  sat  at  his  feet  to  be  catechized  and 
taught  the  way  of  the  Lord,  and  who  had 
come  to  look  upon  his  mother's  old  friend 
and  teacher  as  a  second  father,  and  to  render 
to  him  the  offices  of  filial  piety"  (Swete, 
"Commentary,"  p.  xvi). 

2.    A  Congenial  Atmosphere  at  Last. 

Peter  was  sure  to  understand  John  Mark 
and  he  knew  his  family  history,  his  gifts  and 
temperament.  The  work  with  Peter  was  with 
the  Jewish  Christians,  for  he  was  the  leader 
of  this  work  as  Paul  of  the  Gentile  mission 
(Gal.  2  : 9).  Here  Mark  would  have  fewer 
scruples  and  could  find  ample  play  for  his 
powers.  All  that  was  in  him  ought  to  come 
out.  Mark  was  fortunate  in  his  teachers.  It 
is  not  every  young  preacher  who  falls  under 


PETER'S  SON  AND  INTERPRETER    113 

the  tutelage  of  three  men  like  Paul,  Barnabas, 
and  Peter.  The  best  thing  in  any  school  is 
the  personality  of  the  teachers.  One  really 
great  teacher  in  a  school  justifies  the  school. 
Pupils  forget  the  lessons  and  make  sport  of 
their  teachers,  but  some  men  they  cannot  for- 
get. It  is  precisely  so  in  the  school  of  life. 
It  is  true  that  Mark  found  Paul  a  sterner  and 
stricter  teacher  than  Barnabas  and  Peter,  but 
we  must  not  imagine  that  Paul  did  not  help 
Mark.  Indeed,  his  very  severity  may  have 
been  the  saving  of  Mark  in  the  end.  Chas- 
tisement does  not  seem  good  at  the  time,  not 
even  chastisement  from  the  Lord  (Heb.  12  :  ii). 
There  will  come  a  time  when  we  may  be  able 
to  rejoice  even  in  the  chastisement.  But  life 
is  not  meant  to  be  all  chastisement.  There  is 
a  joy  of  work  that  calls  out  the  best  that  is  in 
one.  Some  men  are  always  disgruntled  and 
are  never  satisfied  with  the  task  which  they 
have.  They  imagine  that  they  would  be 
happy  and  useful  somewhere  else  and  at  some 
other  work.  A  restless  spirit  like  that  creates 
worry  and  unfits  one  for  work  of  a  high  or- 
der. The  cure  may  be  in  a  change  of  sphere. 
More  likely  the  cure  can  be  found  in  doing 
heartily    whatever  one  has  to  do.    Joy  in 


114    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MIKISTEY 

work  comes,  to  be  sure,  from  doing  a  thing 
well,  but  one  may  do  well  whatever  is  in 
hand  and  find  joy  in  doing  it  better.  The 
affectionate  description  of  Mark  by  Peter 
proves  that  there  was  genuine  camaraderie 
between  these  two  men,  master  and  dis- 
ciple as  they  were.  Confidence  begets  love. 
Fidelity  begets  confidence.  It  is  clear, 
therefore,  that  now  Mark  was  throwing 
his  whole  soul  into  the  work  with  Simon 
Peter. 

3.    The  Time  of  the  Work  with  Peter. 

There  is  doubt  as  to  the  precise  time  when 
he  became  firmly  associated  with  Peter. 
Swete  thinks  that  it  was  not  till  after  Paul's 
death.  That  is  hardly  likely,  for  the  Gospel 
of  Mark  was  probably  written  in  the  fifties, 
certainly  before  the  Gospel  of  Luke,  which 
in  turn  was  before  the  Acts,  and  Acts  was 
written  by  A.  D.  63  if  Luke  closes  the  book 
because  events  had  only  proceeded  thus  far. 
We  may  think  therefore  of  Mark  with  Peter 
during  most  of,  the  fifties  and  the  early  six- 
ties. This  was  while  Paul  was  doing  his 
great  work  during  the  second  and  third  mis- 
sion tours,  the  imprisonment  at  Caesarea  and 


PETER'S  SON  AND  INTERPRETER    115 

in  Rome.  He  will  meet  Paul,  as  we  shall  see, 
toward  the  close  of  this  period.  There  is  no 
inconsistency  in  thinking  of  Mark  as  being 
of  service  to  Paul  while  he  was  still  the  fol- 
lower of  Peter.  The  length  of  the  stay  with 
Peter  is  not  known,  for  we  do  not  know  how 
long  Mark  was  with  Barnabas  in  Cyprus,  but 
it  may  very  well  have  been  some  dozen  years 
or  more.  It  was  during  this  period  that  Mark 
wrote  his  Gospel,  as  we  shall  see,  and  so 
made  his  real  contribution  to  Christianity. 
That  grew  directly  out  of  his  love  for  Peter 
and  the  heartiness  of  his  cooperation  with 
him. 

4.    Peter's  Dragoman  in  His  Journeys. 

Papias  expressly  says  that  Mark  followed 
not  the  Lord  Jesus,  but  Peter.^  Clement  of 
Alexandria  speaks  of  Mark  as  "  one  who  had 
followed  him  for  a  long  time."  ^  Eusebius 
says  that  Mark  *'  had  become  his  familiar  ac- 
quaintance and  attendant."^  Peter  himself 
says  that  Mark  is  with  him  in  Babylon  when  he 
writes  the  first  Epistle  (i  Pet.  5:13).  The  usual 

^  OUTS    yap  7Jf{ou<Js   too   Kupiou  ooze  naprj/ioXooffrjaev 
aorip,  offTspivj  3i,  aj<;  k'tpi^v,  THrpoj. 
2  Hypot.  in  Eus.  H.  E.  VI.  14. 
^  yv(ifpi/j.u<:  kai  (poiT-qTrj^.     Dem.  Evang.  Ill-  5. 


116    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTBY 

opinion  is  that  Rome  is  here  meant  by  "  Baby- 
lon," mystical  Babylon,  the  great  enemy  of 
Christianity  as  in  the  Apocalypse.  Already  the 
disciples  are  persecuted  as  Christians  (i  Pet. 
4 :  i6)  and  this  was  true  from  A.  D.  46,  the 
date  of  the  burning  of  Rome  by  Nero  who 
laid  his  own  crime  at  the  door  of  the  Chris- 
tians. There  are  many  other  proofs  that 
Peter  was  in  Rome  and  none  that  he  was  in 
Babylon,  though  that  is  the  natural  way  to 
take  his  language.^  However  that  may  be, 
Peter  was  then  near  the  close  of  his  work 
and  travels.  He  is  writing  to  "  the  elect  who 
are  sojourners  of  the  Dispersion  in  Pontus, 
Galatia,  Cappadocia,  Asia  and  Bithynia" 
(i  Pet.  1:1),  regions  where  he  had  probably 
preached  himself,  thus  covering  a  part  of 
Paul's  old  territory.  It  is  quite  probable  that 
Peter  had  Mark  with  him  during  these  jour- 
neys. There  are  traditions  also  that  Mark 
preached  in  Egypt.  He  is  credited  with  some 
share  in  the  founding  of  the  church  in  Alex- 
andria. But  the  testimony  is  very  strong 
that  in  various  parts  of  the  world  Mark  was 

*  Swete  considers  it  "  highly  improbable  "  that  there 
were  Jews  enough  in  Babylon  at  this  time  to  justify  a  visit 
from  Peter  ("  Comm.,"  p.  xvi). 


PETER'S  SON  AND  INTERPEETER    117 

Peter's  "  interpreter  "  or  dragoman  quite  apart 
from  the  writing  of  the  Gospel.  Papias  states 
it,  as  already  noted,  but  so  also  does  Ter- 
tullian,  **  Peter,  whose  interpreter^  Mark  was  " 
{Adv.  Marc,  iv.  5).  Jerome  refers  to  "  Mark, 
disciple  and  interpreter  of  Peter"  (de  vir, 
illustr,  viii)  and  adds  that  Titus  was  Paul's 
interpreter.  But  Paul  did  not  usually  need 
an  interpreter  for  he  was  fluent  in  Greek  and 
Aramaic  and  probably  knew  Latin  also.^ 
Some  think  that  Peter  used  Mark  as  his  in- 
terpreter when  he  addressed  audiences  who 
understood  Latin  best.  But  this  could  have 
been  quite  seldom,  for  we  have  no  account  of 
Peter's  work  in  North  Africa  or  Spain  where 
Latin  would  be  most  needed.  Even  in  Rome 
Greek  was  current.  "Simon  Peter  on  the 
other  hand,  if  he  could  express  himself  in 
Greek  at  all,  could  scarcely  have  possessed 
sufficient  knowledge  of  the  language  to  ad- 
dress a  Roman  congregation  with  success*' 
(Swete,  "  Commentary,"  p.  xx).  This  opinion 
hardly  does  justice  to  Peter's  knowledge 
of  the  vernacular  Koine.     It  is  most  likely 

'  Robertson,  "  Grammar  of  the  Greek  New  Testament 
in  the  Light  of  Historical  Research,"  p.  no. 


118    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

that  Peter  spoke  in  Greek  on  the  day  of 
Pentecost  since  he  addressed  Jews  from  all 
parts  of  the  world  (Acts  2  :  qL,  14).  Galilee 
was  a  bilingual  country  and  most  men  needed 
to  know  both  Aramaic  and  Greek.  It  is 
quite  possible,  however,  that  Peter  did  not 
feel  at  home  in  the  Greek  as  in  his  native 
Aramaic,  and  even  that  had  a  Galilean  ac- 
cent (Matt.  26  :  73).  Unless  one  has  learned 
to  think  in  a  language  and  has  an  adequate 
vocabulary,  he  cannot  speak  rapidly  and  with 
ease  before  an  audience.  Swete  ("  Commen- 
tary," p.  xix)  notes  that  **  when  Joseph  as 
an  Egyptian  prince  communicates  with  his 
brethren  from  Palestine  he  uses  the  services 
of  an  interpreter."  *  And  Paul  forbids  the 
exercise  of  the  gift  of  tongues  at  Corinth  un- 
less an  interpreter  is  present  to  translate  what 
is  said.  Mark  knew  Aramaic  well  as  a  Je- 
rusalem Jew  and  his  Latin  surname  implies 
that  he  was  a  Hellenistic  Jew  on  one  side  of 
his  family  and  so  would  know  Greek  well. 
The  Greek  word  for  interpreter  means  **  the 
secretary  or  dragoman  who  translates  his 
master's  words  into  a  foreign  tongue  "  (Swete, 

*  Cf.  Gen.  42  :  23  (LXX)  6  yap  kpfr^veuxij^  dvd  fxiaov 
aotwv  ^v. 


PETER'S  SON  AND  INTERPEBTER    119 

**  Commentary,"  p.  xix).  In  our  modern 
parlance  Mark  was  Simon  Peter's  private  sec- 
retary. He  may  indeed  have  been  Peter's 
amanuensis  for  the  First  Epistle,  though  Peter 
seems  to  imply  that  Silvanus  (Silas)  performed 
that  office  on  this  occasion  :  "  By  Silvanus, 
our  faithful  brother,  as  I  account  him,  I  have 
written  unto  you  briefly  "  (i  Pet.  5  :  12).  We 
know  that  Tertius  acted  as  amanuensis  for 
Paul  in  the  Episde  to  the  Romans  (16  :  22). 
However,  here  Peter  may  mean  that  Silvanus 
simply  acted  as  the  bearer  of  the  Epistle  to 
the  readers.  In  any  case  it  is  interesting  to 
note  that  both  Silas  and  Mark  are  here  to- 
gether with  Peter,  both  former  helpers  of 
Paul.  Evidently  the  old  sore  was  healed 
long  ago  and  everything  was  in  good  shape 
on  all  sides.  If  Peter  wrote  the  Second  Epis- 
tle, as  I  consider  on  the  whole  likely,  it  is 
possible  that  there  we  have  a  specimen  of 
Peter's  own  Greek  (quite  vernacular),  while 
in  I  Peter  the  amanuensis  exercised  certain 
liberties  of  style  and  statement. 

5.    The  Genius  for  Personal  Service. 
Blessed  is  the  man  who  finds  the  task  for 
which  he  was  made.     It  is  not  always  easy 


120    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

to  do.  At  school  some  pupils  are  drones  in 
one  class  and  stars  in  another.  Others  shine 
in  every  class.  People  have  different  turns 
beyond  a  doubt.  The  Holy  Spirit  bestows 
one  gift  upon  one,  another  upon  another 
(i  Cor.  12:11)  "dividing  to  each  one 
severally  as  he  will."  Undoubtedly  Mark 
had  a  natural  aptitude  for  personal  service  to 
those  men  whom  he  loved.  **  Not  endowed 
with  gifts  of  leadership,  neither  prophet  nor 
teacher,  he  knew  how  to  be  invaluable  to 
those  who  filled  the  first  rank  in  the  service 
of  the  Church,  and  proved  himself  a  true 
servus  servorum  DeV^  (Swete,  "Com- 
mentary," pp.  XV f.).  He  was  "attendant" 
to  Barnabas  and  Saul.  He  is  now  "inter- 
preter" to  Peter.  He  could  make  himself 
preeminently  useful  in  such  a  relation.  All 
arrangements  for  travel,  provisions  for  food 
and  lodging,  carrying  messages,  arranging 
interviews,  translating  conversations  or  ad- 
dresses, came  natural  to  Mark.  It  was 
second  nature  to  him  and  he  enjoyed  doing 
it.  There  is  a  story  that  Mark  had  once 
been  a  priest  and  that,  after  becoming  a 
Christian,  he  amputated  a  finger  so  that  he 
would  be  disqualified  from  being  a  priest 


PETEE'S  SON  AKD  INTEBPEETER    121 

any  more.^  It  is  hard  to  credit  the  story, 
though  he  may  have  had  one  stump-finger. 
But  we  are  not  to  think  of  Mark  as  a  mere 
valet  to  Barnabas,  Paul,  or  Peter.  It  was 
not  menial,  but  official  service  that  he  chiefly 
rendered,  though  he  was  ready  to  do  any 
service  that  was  necessary.  He  was  the 
friend  and  companion  of  these  great  preach- 
ers, not  a  hireling.  We  have  the  words  of 
Jesus  for  saying  that  the  greatest  in  the 
Kingdom  of  God  is  he  who  serves  most. 
Mark  himself  records  it  thus ;  "  If  any  man 
would  be  first,  he  shall  be  last  of  all,  and  serv- 
ant of  all  "  (Mark  9  :  35).  He  also  gives  this 
logion  of  Jesus:  "Whosoever  would  become 
great  among  you  shall  be  your  minister 
(servant);  and  whosoever  would  be  first 
among  you  shall  be  servant  (slave)  of  all " 
(Mark  10 :  44).  ^  One  may  suppose  that 
Peter  told  these  sayings  of  Jesus  and  that 
Mark  recorded  them.  They  are  pertinent 
words  for  Mark's  own  life.  Humility  is 
essential  to  real  service.  Peter  wrote :  "Yea, 
all  of  you  gird  yourselves  with  humility,  to 

*  Hence  the  nickname  KoXo^oddfzroXot:. 
^  didkovo^  and  dovko^.     Both  used  by  Christ  as  terms 
of  honor. 


122    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

serve  one  another  "  (i  Pet.  5 : 5),  doubtless 
with  memories  of  the  night  when  Jesus 
girded  upon  Himself  the  towel  and  washed 
the  disciples'  feet,  even  Peter's  over  his  pro- 
test (John  13:5-11).  Mark's  own  failure  at 
Perga  probably  helped  to  make  him  humble 
now  and  able  to  sympathize  more  with  the 
failings  of  others.  Who  can  tell  what  is 
primary  and  what  is  secondary  after  all  ?  It 
is  not  always  true  that  the  man  most  in  the 
public  eye  is  the  one  who  does  the  greatest 
service  for  God  and  man.  Jesus  gave  His 
estimate  of  His  own  work  in  terms  of  service. 
"  For  the  Son  of  man  also  came  not  to  be 
ministered  unto,  but  to  minister,^  and  to  give 
his  life  a  ransom  for  many  "  (Mark  10 :  45). 
Jesus  glorified  the  little  things  of  life  and  lifted 
the  cup  of  cold  water  to  the  level  of  dignity 
and  nobility.  So  we  can  understand  the  life 
of  Florence  Nightingale,  of  Clara  Barton,  of 
the  Red  Cross  work,  of  the  trained  nurses 
of  our  time.  We  need  waste  no  pity  upon 
Mark  because  it  fell  to  his  lot  to  play  second- 
fiddle,  as  we  say,  to  great  men  like  Paul, 
Barnabas,  and  Peter.  Aaron  was  the  mouth- 
piece of  Moses.     Luther  had  his  Melancthon. 

*  dia/zovTJffai, 


PETEE^S  SON  AND  INTEEPEETER    123 

The  reward  that  one  gets  from  God  does  not 
depend  upon  the  post  that  he  holds,  but 
upon  the  fidelity  with  which  the  post  is  dis- 
charged. The  minister  is  a  steward  of  the 
mysteries  of  God  and  "it  is  required  of 
stewards  that  a  man  be  found  faithful  '* 
(i  Cor.  4 : 2).  Beyond  a  doubt  Mark  was 
happy  with  Peter  and  rejoiced  in  the  favor 
that  met  Peter  everywhere.  Peter  was  the 
chief  apostle  of  the  twelve  and  Mark  was  the 
follower  of  this  follower  of  Jesus.  **  Be  ye 
imitators  of  me,  even  as  I  also  am  of  Christ " 
(i  Cor.  II :  i).  So  Paul  openly  taught.  So 
Mark  practised.  He  belonged  to  the  second 
generation  as  did  Paul,  but  Paul  had  a  vision 
of  Christ  that  made  him  an  apostle  as  to 
one  born  out  of  due  time  (i  Cor.  15:8). 
There  was,  therefore,  an  inevitable  discount 
in  public  opinion  for  one  like  Mark  who 
companied  with  a  man  like  Peter  who  had 
walked  and  talked  with  Jesus.  Mark  was  a 
satellite  and  did  nothing  to  throw  a  shadow 
in  Peter's  path.  There  was  glory  enough  for 
both,  as  Schley  said  of  the  Santiago  battle, 
but  Peter  was  the  man  that  men  wished  to 
hear.  He  spoke  from  personal  acquaintance 
and  intimate  knowledge.     The  day  was  com- 


124    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

ing  when  there  would  be  no  more  such  men. 
Meanwhile  it  was  their  day  and  Mark  did  not 
begrudge  Peter  the  post  of  honor  at  every 
turn.  The  rather  he  endeavored  to  make 
him  comfortable  and  to  make  his  message 
efEective.  If  one  is  disposed  to  look  down 
upon  Mark  for  being  willing  to  be  a  mere 
assistant  to  Peter,  let  him  reflect  that  thus  he 
enabled  Peter  to  set  forth  Jesus  to  multitudes 
whom  he  could  not  otherwise  reach.  Peter's 
vivid  Aramaic  was  transmuted  into  Mark's  ^ 
vivacious  vernacular  Koine  and  no  doubt 
Mark  took  a  certain  pride  in  his  skill  as 
interpreter.  In  a  sense  he  had  to  make  the 
message  his  own  and  his  own  personality 
had  a  chance  to  count  as  he  used  his  own 
turns  of  expression  and  favorite  idioms.  In 
serving  Peter  Mark  was  serving  Christ. 
Mark  widened  the  avenues  of  Peter's  influ- 
ence and  Peter  enlarged  the  sphere  of  Mark's 
activities.  The  two  men  supplemented  each 
other.  Mark  was  more  than  a  Boswell  to 
Peter,  for  in  writing  the  Gospel  the  stamp 
of  his  own  genius  appears.  That  book  is 
enough  to  immortalize  any  man,  but  that 
thought  was  furthest  of  all  from  Mark's 
mind.     Peter  taught  Mark  how  to  picture 


PETEE^S  SON  AND  INTERPEETEE    125 

Jesus  so  that  men  could  see  Him  as  he  saw 
Him  by  the  sea  of  Galilee.  Who  can  say 
that  the  greatest  achievement  of  Peter's  life 
was  not  precisely  this,  that  he  so  stamped 
the  words  and  life  of  Jesus  upon  the  mind  of 
Mark,  his  interpreter  and  friend,  that  he  was 
able  to  make  that  image  the  permanent  pos- 
session of  all  the  ages?  It  is  hardly  likely 
that  Peter  knew  that  his  chief  influence 
through  the  ages  would  be  through  John 
Mark.  Our  lives  are  strangely  blended. 
The  best  that  any  one  can  do  is  to  stand  in 
his  lot  and  to  do  his  duty.  Mark  did  his 
duty  by  Peter  and  Peter  gave  him  his  whole 
heart  and  loved  him  as  a  son.  What  cares 
the  mother  for  all  the  myriad  demands  from 
her  child?  She  joyfully  gives  all  and  gets 
all  in  the  giving. 


IX 

MARK^S  WONDROUS  GOSPEL 

*'  Yea,  I  will  give  diligence  that  at  every  time  ye  may 
be  able  after  my  decease  to  call  these  things  to  re- 
membrance''  —2  Peter  1 :  15. 


IX 

MARK'S  WONDROUS  GOSPEL 

I.    The  Purpose  of  Peter. 

THE  early  writers  differ  very  much  in 
their  views  concerning  the  part  that 
Peter  played  in  the  Gospel  of  Mark. 
This  we  shall  examine  presently.  The  point 
to  note  here  is  the  possible,  even  probable, 
meaning  of  2  Peter  i :  15.  There  are  diffi- 
culties, to  be  sure,  in  pressing  this  passage, 
since  so  many  modern  scholars  deny  the 
Petrine  authorship  of  this  Epistle.  As  for 
myself  I  hold  with  Bigg  ("  International  Crit- 
ical Commentary  on  2  Peter")  that  the  bal- 
ance of  probability  is  in  favor  of  the  Petrine 
authorship,  though  the  arguments  against  it 
are  admittedly  strong.  It  is  quite  possible 
that  in  2  Peter  we  have  Peter's  own  some- 
what uncouth  vernacular  Koine  (cf.  Acts  4:13) 
unrevised  by  Mark  or  Silas.  On  the  basis  of 
the  genuineness  of  2  Peter  a  very  interesting 
129 


130    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

question  is  raised  by  i :  15.  What  does  Peter 
mean  by  giving  diligence  that  after  his  de- 
cease *  the  readers  of  the  Epistle  may  be  able 
at  every  time  to  call  these  things  to  remem- 
brance ?  What  are  "these  things "  ?  He  uses 
the  same  expression  in  i :  12  and  says  that 
they  "  know  them."  He  is  speaking  of  the 
things  of  Christ  and  proceeds  to  affirm  that 
he  did  not  follow  cunningly  devised  fables 
when  he  declared  unto  them  "  the  power  and 
coming  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  but  we  were 
eye-witnesses  of  his  majesty  "  (2  Pet.  i :  16). 
Then  comes  a  reference  to  the  glory  on  the 
Mount  of  Transfiguration.  It  seems  a  nat- 
ural supposition  and  one  that  has  won  the 
support  of  various  scholars  ^  to-day  that  Peter  1 
has  in  mind  a  plan  to  have  a  Gospel  pre- 
pared that  shall  put  in  permanent  form  his 
knowledge  of  Jesus.  While  he  was  "  in  this 
tabernacle  "  (i :  13)  he  thought  it  his  duty  to 
put  them  in  remembrance  of  the  things  of 

*  e^odov.  The  word  used  of  the  death  of  Jesus  in  the 
talk  with  Moses  and  Elijah  on  the  Mount  (Luke  9:31). 

^  Irenaeus  (Haer.  III.  i,  i)  understands  the  passage  to 
refer  to  Mark's  Gospel,  but  misunderstands  Peter  as  say- 
ing that  the  Gospel  was  to  be  written  after  his  decease. 
He  says  that  it  is  to  be  "  written  so  as  to  be  of  use  after 
his  death"  (Bigg,  in  loco). 


MARK'S  WONDROUS  GOSPEL      131 

Christ.  It  is  a  natural  desire  for  one  to  wish 
to  preserve  what  he  knows  so  well  for  the 
benefit  of  those  less  favored.  It  is  often 
one's  duty  to  do  this.  Many,  like  Peter, 
find  the  burden  of  writing  {onus  scribendt) 
a  fatal  obstacle  to  authorship.  It  is  not 
every  gifted  speaker  who  can,  like  Paul, 
wield  the  pen  with  equal  facility.  Spurgeon 
and  Maclaren  are  modern  instances  of  wiz- 
ards alike  with  tongue  and  pen.  But  Peter 
was  rich  in  the  possession  of  one  who  had 
heard  him  preach  so  often  that  he  under- 
stood perfectly  his  interpretation  of  Jesus. 
Besides,  Mark,  as  Peter's  interpreter,  had 
already  had  long  experience  in  this  very 
thing.  He  was  at  home  in  the  current 
vernacular  Koine  and  would  be  able  to  do 
the  literary  side  of  the  work  more  skillfully 
than  Peter.  On  this  view,  then,  Peter  laid 
upon  Mark  the  task  of  preparing  his  Mem- 
oirs of  Jesus  which  Mark  undertook  as  a 
filial  trust.  This  is  certainly  a  possible  in- 
terpretation of  2  Peter  i :  15.  Bigg  ("Inter- 
national Critical  Commentary,"  in  loco)  says  : 
"If  a  Gospel  is  meant,  the  reference  can 
hardly  be  to  any  other  than  that  of  St. 
Mark." 


132    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

2.    The  Suggestion  of  the  Church  at  Rome. 

Papias  does  not  say  that  Peter  proposed 
to  Mark  to  write  the  Gospel  nor  does  he  say 
that  the  church  at  Rome  made  the  sugges- 
tion. That  is  to  say,  Eusebius  makes  no 
quotation  from  Papias  to  that  effect.  But 
Eusebius  (H.  E.  II.  15)  does  say  on  the  au- 
thority of  Papias  and  Clement  of  Alexandria 
that  the  Christians  at  Rome  urged  Mark  to 
write  the  Gospel  and  that  Peter  approved  it : 
"So  charmed  were  the  Romans  with  the 
light  that  shone  in  upon  their  minds  from 
the  discourses  of  Peter,  that,  not  contented 
with  a  single  hearing  and  the  viva  voce  proc- 
lamation of  the  truth,  they  urged  with  the 
utmost  solicitation  on  Mark,  whose  Gospel 
is  in  circulation  and  who  was  Peter's  attend- 
ant, that  he  would  leave  them  in  writing  a 
record  of  the  teaching  which  they  had  re- 
ceived by  word  of  mouth.  They  did  not 
give  over  till  they  had  prevailed  on  him : 
and  thus  they  became  the  cause  of  the  com- 
position of  the  so-called  Gospel  according  to 
Mark.  It  is  said  that  when  the  apostle 
knew,  by  the  revelation  of  the  Spirit,  what 
was  done,  he  was  pleased  with  the  eagerness 
of  the  men  and  authorized  the  writing  to  be 


MAEK'S  WONDEOUS  GOSPEL      133 

read  in  the  churches"  (Translation  of  J.  H. 
Farmer  in  International  Standard  Bible  En- 
cyclopaedia). The  account  given  by  Clement 
of  Alexandria  (Hypotyp.  as  quoted  in  Euse- 
bius,  H.  E.  VI.  14)  is  quite  similar;  "The 
occasion  for  writing  the  Gospel  according  to 
Mark  was  as  follows :  After  Peter  had  pub- 
licly preached  the  word  in  Rome  and  de- 
clared the  Gospel  by  the  Spirit,  many  who 
were  present  entreated  Mark,  as  one  who 
had  followed  him  for  a  long  time  and  re- 
membered what  he  said,  to  write  down  what 
he  had  spoken,  and  Mark,  after  composing 
the  Gospel,  presented  it  to  his  petitioners. 
When  Peter  became  aware  of  it,  he  neither 
eagerly  hindered  nor  promoted  it"  (ibid.). 
We  thus  seem  to  have  a  definite  and  fairly 
certain  tradition  that  connects  our  Gospel  of 
Mark  with  Rome.  Clement  of  Alexandria 
wrote  about  200  A.  D.  The  work  was  done 
also  while  Peter  was  alive.  Eusebius  (H.  E. 
V.  8),  however,  quotes  Irenseus  {Adv.  Haer. 
III.  i)  as  saying  that  "  after  the  departure  " 
(exit,  "exodus")  of  Paul  and  Peter,  Mark, 
Peter's  disciple,  delivered  to  us  in  writing 
the  things  preached  by  Peter.  Irenaeus  ap- 
parently locates  the  writing  in   Rome,   but 


134    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

after  Peter's  death.  It  is  not  possible  to  tell 
who  is  right  as  to  the  time  except  by  an 
appeal  to  synoptic  criticism.  That  decides 
against  Irenaeus.  However,  Mark's  Gospel 
is  generally  called  the  Roman  Gospel  since 
it  apparently  made  its  appearance  in  Rome 
and  suits  the  Roman  love  of  action  and 
power.  It  has  even  been  suggested  that 
Mark  wrote  his  Gospel  in  Latin,  but  this  is 
pure  conjecture. 

3.    Early  Date  of  Mark's  Gospel. 

It  is  here  assumed  against  Blass,  Marshall, 
and  Wellhausen  that  Mark  wrote  his  Gospel, 
not  in  Aramaic,  but  in  Greek.  Swete  ("  Com- 
mentary," p.  xxxvii)  observes  that  the  use  of 
both  transliteration  and  translation  of  Ara- 
maic terms  by  Mark  shows  that  he  is  not 
translating,  but  writing  freely  in  Greek.  It 
is  assumed  also  that  the  present  canonical 
Gospel  is  substantially  as  Mark  wrote  it. 
There  may  have  been  a  few  editorial  touches 
here  and  there,  but  not  many.  Hawkins, 
after  an  elaborate  and  minute  examination  of 
the  peculiarities  of  Mark's  Gospel,  admits 
some  eight  or  ten  verbal  additions  (**  Horse 
Synopticae,"  p.  152).     But  the  essential  unity 


MAEK'S  WONDEOUS  GOSPEL      135 

oi  the  book  is  proven.     Swete  sums  the  mat- 
ter up  thus  :  "  The  present  writer  has  risen 
from  his  study  of  the  Gospel  with  a  strong 
sense  of  the  unity  of  the  work,  and  can  echo 
the  requiescat  Urmarkus  which  ends  a  recent 
discussion"  (*' Commentary,"  pp.  If.,  note). 
Minor  editorial  revision  is  quite  a  different 
matter  from  the  theory  of  Bacon  that  a  Re- 
dactor reworked  Mark's  original  Gospel  and 
produced  our  present  canonical  Gospel  under 
Pauline  influences   ("Beginnings  of  Gospel 
Story,"    pp.   xvii-xxxiii).      Another   modern 
theory  is  that  of  Wendling  ^  who  finds  three 
Marks  (M,'  M,'  M,').     The  last  is  our  canon- 
ical Mark.     The  first  he  calls  the  historian, 
the  second  the  poet,  the  third  the  theologian. 
It  is  all  very  pretty  and  very  improbable. 
Holdsworth  ("  Gospel  Origins,"  p.  115)  thinks 
that  Mark  himself  made  three  editions  of  his 
Gospel  (one  in  Caesarea,  one  in  Alexandria, 
and  one  in  Rome  (our  Gospel).     But  all  this 
speculation  clears  away  when  we  face  the  fact 
that  our  present  Gospel  of  Mark  must  in  all 
probability  itself  be  dated  in  the  fifties.     It  is 
now  a  commonplace  in  synoptic  criticism  that 

1 "  Urmarcus,**    1905;    "Die   Entstehung  des  Mar- 
cusevangeliums,"  1909. 


136    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

Mark^s  Gospel  was  used  by  Matthew  and 
Luke.  "The  most  notable  achievement  in 
the  department  of  recent  New  Testament 
criticism  is  undoubtedly  the  fairly  general 
agreement  arrived  at  with  regard  to  the  mu- 
tual relations  of  the  first  three  Gospels  "  (M. 
Jones,  "The  New  Testament  in  the  Twen- 
tieth Century/*  1914,  p.  189).  "The  priority 
of  St.  Mark's  Gospel  is  now  generally  accepted 
by  modern  critics"  (Holdsworth,  "Gospel 
Origins,"  1913,  p.  104).  This  is  the  fact  as 
scholars  to-day  view  it.  John's  Gospel  is  the 
latest  and  was  written  to  supplement  the  Syn- 
optic Gospels.  It  is  not  clear  whether  Luke 
made  use  of  Matthew  or  not,  but  certainly 
Luke  wrote  his  Gospel  before  the  Acts,  for 
he  refers  to  it  in  Acts  1:1.  The  probable 
explanation  of  the  close  of  the  Acts  with  Paul 
a  prisoner  in  Rome  for  two  years  is  that  Luke 
wrote  the  Acts  during  those  two  years  and 
closed  the  book  at  that  point  because  events 
had  only  developed  that  far.  Harnack  ("  Date 
of  the  Acts  and  the  Synoptic  Gospels, "  tr. 
191 1,  p.  99)  holds  that  the  concluding  verses 
of  Acts  "  make  it  in  the  highest  degree  proba- 
ble that  the  work  was  written  at  a  time  when 
St.  Paul's  trial  in  Rome  had  not  yet  come  to 


MABK'S  WONDEOUS  GOSPEL      137 

an  end."  It  must  come  before  the  destruction 
of  Jerusalem  and  the  death  of  Paul  {ibid.^ 
p.  II 6),  before  the  burning  of  Rome,  and 
probably  in  the  year  A.  D.  62  {ibid,^  p.  92). 
This  position  compels  us  to  place  the  date  of 
Luke's  Gospel  before  A.  D.  62,  and  we  must 
date  it  either  in  the  early  part  of  Paul's  first 
Roman  imprisonment  (A.  D.  59  or  60)  or,  as 
is  most  likely,  the  close  of  the  imprisonment 
in  Caesarea  (A.  D.  58  or  59).  Now  Luke  made 
use  of  both  oral  and  written  sources  in  pre- 
paring his  Gospel  (Luke  i  :  1-4).  The  body 
of  Mark's  Gospel  is  reproduced  in  both  Mat- 
thew and  Luke  as  any  one  can  see  for  him- 
self by  looking  at  a  Harmony  of  the  Gospels 
like  that  of  Broadus  or  of  Stevens  and  Burton. 
Clearly  then  Mark's  Gospel  is  earlier  than  the 
Gospel  of  Luke  (and  of  Matthew).  But  how 
much  earlier  ?  If  Luke  made  use  of  Matthew 
also,  we  should  have  to  place  the  Greek  Mat- 
thew about  A.  D.  54  to  57.  But  that  is  not 
certain.  But  in  any  case  there  is  every  proba- 
bility that  Mark's  Gospel  in  Greek  appeared 
in  the  early  years  of  the  fifth  decade  ^  (A.  D. 
50  to  55).     At  first  this  conclusion  may  seem 

*  Nolloth,  "  The  Rise  of  the  Christian  Rch'gion,"  19 1 7, 
p.  19. 


138    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

inconsistent  with  the  tradition  that  Mark's 
Gospel  was  written  in  Rome.  There  is,  how- 
ever, nothing  to  make  it  so.  Peter  and  Mark 
could  very  well  have  been  in  Rome  in  the 
early  fifties  and  then  again  at  the  time  of  the 
writing  of  i  Peter  5  :  13.  It  is  shown  there- 
fore that  Mark's  Gospel  is  the  earliest  of  our  f 
canonical  Gospels  and  is  the  historical  frame- 
work of  both  Matthew  and  Luke.  It  is  im- 
possible, therefore,  to  overestimate  the  im- 
portance of  this  earliest  Gospel  to  the  modern 
student.  "No  man  can  pretend  to  have 
seriously  examined  the  historical  basis  of  the 
Christian  faith  who  has  not  to  some  extent 
applied  the  ordinary  processes  of  historical 
criticism  to  the  Gospel  of  Mark,  the  earliest 
extant  embodiment  of  the  evangelic  story " 
(Bacon,  "The  Beginnings  of  the  Gospel 
Story,"  1909,  p.  vii).  Even  Pfleiderer  is 
willing  to  admit:  "Nothing  can  be  urged 
against  the  church  tradition  that  this  Gos- 
pel was  written  by  John  Mark"  ("Chris- 
tian Origins,"  tr.  1906,  p.  222),  the  John 
Mark  who  left  Paul  and  Barnabas  at  Perga, 
but  who  has  "  come  back  "  in  great  form  in 
his  work  with  Simon  Peter.  Thank  God 
that    a  young   preacher  can   rise  above  a 


MARK'S  WONDROUS  GOSPEL      139 

blunder  and   make   good  in   another  place 
after  failure. 

4.     Peter's  Reminiscences. 

There  is  nothing  in  the  book  itself  that 
would  prove  that  Mark  obtained  his  informa- 
tion chiefly  from  Simon  Peter.  But,  once 
this  fact  is  admitted,  there  is  abundant  illus- 
tration and  confirmation  of  its  correctness. 
Papias  says  that  Mark  became  the  interpreter 
of  Peter,  and  "  whatever  he  remembered,^  he 
wrote  accurately,  not  however  in  order,  the 
things  either  said  or  done  by  Christ."  Papias 
adds  that  Peter  "made  his  instructions  to 
meet  the  needs  (of  his  hearers,  like  other 
preachers),  but  not  as  if  he  were  making  an 
orderly  arrangement^  (or  full  report)  of  the 
Lord's  discourses.^  So  then  Mark  made  no 
mistake  writing  thus  some  things  as  he  re- 
called ^  them,  for  he  took  forethought  for  one 
thing,  to  omit  nothing  of  what  he  had  heard 
and  to  make  no  false  statement  in  them." 
Papias,  as  quoted  in  Eusebius,  has  here  given 
a  very  modest  picture  of  Mark's  Gospel  and 

^  ifx\^7jii6>euff£v.  ^  ffbvraqtv. 

'  rwv  kupiafcwv  Xnyiw^.  Cf.  the  recently  discovered 

Logia  of  Jesus  by  Grenfell  and  Hunt  (1897)  ;  "  New 

Sayings  of  Jesus"  (1904).  *  d.7:e/x>7jfi6v£U(xev, 


140    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

yet  one  wholly  in  accord  with  the  book  as  we 
have  it.  It  is  not  a  complete  story  of  the  life 
of  Jesus.  All  the  early  life  and  most  of  the 
early  ministry  is  passed  by.  It  is  quite  in- 
complete, but  it  is  accurate  and,  in  the  main, 
chronological.  Justin  Martyr  {DiaL  with 
Trypho,  cvi)  calls  this  Gospel  Peter's  "  Mem- 
oirs,*' ^  or  Memorabilia  like  Xenophon's  Mem- 
orabilia of  Socrates.  Irenaeus  {Adv,  Haer, 
III.  i)  says  that  Mark  "  has  delivered  to  us 
in  writing  the  things  preached  by  Peter." 
Tertullian  {Adv,  Marc,  IV.  5)  says  that  this 
Gospel  *'  may  be  ascribed  to  Peter,  whose  in- 
terpreter Mark  was."  Origen  in  his  commen- 
tary on  Matthew  (Eus.  H.  E.  VI.  25)  states 
that  Mark  "  composed  it  as  Peter  guided  him,^ 
who  therefore  in  his  Catholic  epistle  acknowl- 
edged the  evangelist  as  his  son."  Eusebius 
{Dem,  Evang.  III.  5)  expressly  says :  **  Mark 
indeed  writes  this,  but  it  is  Peter  who  so  tes- 
tifies about  himself,  for  all  that  is  in  Mark  are 
memoirs  of  the  discourses  of  Peter."  Jerome 
De  vir,  illustr,,  XI.)  has  carried  this  tradition 
still  further :  "  whose  Gospel  was  composed, 
Peter  narrating  and  Mark  writing." 

'  ^ATrofjLVTjfjLOveufiaTa, 

*  a»9  Ilirpo^  v^Tj-jrijaaTo  aor^. 


MAEK'S  WONDEOUS  GOSPEL      141 

Evideatly  the  story  of  Peter's  connection 
with  Mark's  Gospel  grew  through  the  cen- 
turies from  Papias  (about  A.  D.  125)  to  Jerome 
(about  A.  D.  350).  We  may  drop  at  once  the 
notion  that  Peter  dictated  the  second  Gospel 
and  that  Mark  was  merely  his  amanuensis  or 
even  that  Peter  "  guided  "  Mark  in  the  com- 
position (Origen),  though  that  is  less  un- 
likely. We  may  admit  as  probable  that  Peter 
saw  the  book  and  approved  its  use  as  Clement 
of  Alexandria  states,  who  says  that  Peter  was 
pleased  with  the  eagerness  of  the  Roman 
Christians  about  the  Gospel  "  and  authorized 
the  writing  to  be  read  in  the  churches  "  (Eus. 
H.  E.  II.  15).  But  what  seems  indisputable 
is  the  fact  that  Mark  used  his  recollections  of 
Peter's  preaching  as  the  chief  basis  of  the 
book.  He  heard  Peter  a  great  deal  for  a 
number  of  years.  He  probably  made  notes 
in  Aramaic  or  in  Greek  of  Peter's  preaching. 
Nolloth  ("The  Rise  of  the  Christian  Religion," 
p.  23)  even  thinks  that  Matthew  made  notes 
of  Christ's  preaching  during  His  ministry  in 
Aramaic  and  that  this  was  the  origin  of  the 
Logia  of  Jesus  (the  Q  of  criticism).  He  speaks 
also  of  "  the  Aramaic  notes  of  the  preaching 
of  St.  Peter  made  by  his   'interpreter'   St 


142    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

Mark,  forming  the  original  copy  of  the  Sec- 
ond Gospel."  Thus  the  two  oldest  sources 
of  the  life  of  Jesus  go  back  to  the  apostles 
Matthew  and  Peter.  It  is,  therefore,  quite 
proper  to  say  that  Peter's  Reminiscences  of 
Jesus  are  preserved  in  the  Gospel  of  Mark. 
The  book  is  in  a  true  sense  the  Memoirs  or 
Memorabilia  of  Peter. 

If  now  we  turn  to  Mark's  Gospel  we  shall 
find  many  things  that  corroborate  this  posi- 
tion. The  book  reveals  many  tokens  of  an 
eye-witness  and  some  of  these  come  most 
naturally  from  Simon  Peter.  The  abundant 
use  of  the  historical  present  in  Mark's  Gospel 
is  probably  due  to  Peter's  lively  descriptive 
powers.  He  pictured  the  incidents  so  clearly 
that  Mark  saw  them  as  actually  going  on 
and  so  narrated  them  as  doubdess  Peter 
told  them.  There  are  151  historic  presents 
in  Mark  and  only  78  in  Matthew,  though  a 
much  longer  book,  only  6  in  Luke  and  13  in 
Acts.*  This  list  does  not  include  parables  for 
Mark  has  no  historic  presents  in  them.  Mark 
is  very  fond  of  the  imperfect  tense  which  is 
another  way  of  using  Peter's  eyes  and  Peter's 
imagination.  There  are  numerous  details 
*  Hawkins,  "  Horae  Synopticae,'*  pp.  147  C 


MAEK^S  WONDEOUS  GOSPEL      143 

which  also  confirm  this  theory,  a  few  of 
which  are  here  given.  When  Jesus  healed 
Peter's  mother-in-law  we  read  that  **  he  came 
and  took  her  by  the  hand  and  raised  her  up  *' 
(Mark  1:31).  At  even  we  find  that  "  all  the 
city  was  gathered  at  the  door  "  (i :  33),  the 
description  probably  of  Peter  who  stood  in 
the  door  of  his  home  with  Jesus  and  watched 
the  excited  throng  pass  by  as  they  were 
healed.  It  seems  to  be  Peter  also  who  gives 
this  life-like  touch :  **  And  in  the  morning,  a 
great  while  before  day,  he  rose  up  and  went 
out  (probably  Peter  heard  him  go),  and  de- 
parted into  a  desert  place,  and  there  prayed. 
And  Simon  and  they  that  were  with  him  fol- 
lowed after  him  (rushed^  after  him  in  eager 
pursuit) ;  and  they  found  him,  and  say  unto 
him,  All  men  are  seeking  thee"  (1:35-37). 
Mark's  narrative  here  bears  every  trace  of 
Peter's  excitement  and  impetuosity  and  vivid 
imagination  in  description.  In  2  :  2  we  read 
that  "there  was  no  longer  room  for  them, 
no,  not  even  about  the  door."  Jesus  was  here 
"  at  home  "  "^  or  **  indoors  "  (2  :  i)  as  we  say, 
preserving  Peter's  colloquial  reference  to  his 

*  Rarediio^ev,     Perfective  use  of  Kara, 

*  iv  oHkip.     Some  manuscripts  ei"?  6]/zov, 


144    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

own  house  in  Capernaum.  Mark  has  much 
about  the  feelings  and  looks  of  Jesus  (cf.  1 143 ; 
3  •  5  ;  5  •  32  ;  6 :  40)  which  come  naturally 
from  an  eye-witness.  *'  Certainly  no  amount 
of  realism  will  account  for  the  scores  of  un- 
expected and  independent  details  with  which 
St.  Mark  enriches  the  common  narrative" 
(Swete,  "Commentary,"  p.  Ivii).  Suffice  it 
to  mention  one  other  touch  of  life.  In 
6:39f.  Mark  speaks  of  the  "green"  grass 
and  notes  that  they  were  grouped  "  in  com- 
panies "  ^  like  guests  at  a  banquet  (symposia) 
and  that  their  many-colored  garments  on  the 
green  grass  in  the  afternoon  sun  made  them 
look  like  "  garden-beds "  ^  ("  in  ranks  "). 
There  are  literally  hundreds  of  such  vivid 
details  in  Mark,  some  of  which  are  preserved 
in  Matthew  and  Luke,  but  most  of  which  are 
smoothed  away  in  their  more  literary  ar- 
rangement. Mark's  Gospel  is,  like  that  of 
John,  full  of  animation,  of  dialogue,  of  pictures. 
It  is  to  the  credit  of  Mark  that,  though  he 
may  not  have  heard  Jesus  himself,  yet  he  has 
faithfully  preserved  the  word- pictures  of  Peter 
who  did  hear  Christ  preach  and  saw  Him  do 

*  Ttpaatai  npaaiai.     Nominative  absolute. 


MARK'S  WONDROUS  GOSPEL      145 

His  work.  Peter  described  Jesus  to  Cor- 
nelius as  one  "  who  went  about  doing  good, 
and  healing  all  that  were  oppressed  of  the 
devil ;  for  God  was  with  him  "  (Acts  lo :  38). 
Mark,  as  we  have  seen,  may  have  been  of 
the  six  brethren  with  Peter  in  Caesarea  and 
may  thus  have  heard  Peter  say  these  words. 
At  any  rate  they  give  an  adequate  conception 
of  Mark's  own  Gospel,  which  is,  at  bottom, 
Peter's  Gospel. 

5.    Other  Sources  Used  by  Mark. 

There  is  no  reason  to  think  that  Mark  con- 
fined himself  to  what  he  heard  from  Peter. 
He,  like  Luke  (i :  1-4),  had  heard  other 
"  eye-witnesses  "  *  of  the  Lord  tell  their  story 
at  his  mother's  home  in  Jerusalem  and  else- 
where. There  are  portions  of  Mark's  Gospel 
that  do  not  come  naturally  from  Peter.  If 
Luke  (i :  1-4)  employed  on  a  large  scale  the 
methods  of  the  historian  in  making  his  re- 
searches, why  may  not  Mark  have  done  so 
on  a  smaller  scale  ?  It  is  probable  that  the 
so-called  Logia  of  Jesus  (Q),  whether  written 
by  Matthew  in  Aramaic  as  Papias  says  or 
by  some  one  else,  was  earlier  than  Mark. 

*  aurdnrat. 


146    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

Ramsay  (The  Expositor,  May,  1907)  suggests 
that  Q  was  written  during  the  lifetime  of 
Jesus.  Salmon  ("The  Human  Element  in 
the  Gospels,"  p.  274)  takes  the  same  view. 
At  any  rate  it  is  probable  that  Q  is  older 
than  Mark.  It  is  even  held  by  some  that 
Mark  made  use  of  Q  to  some  extent.^  There 
is  nothing  impossible  or  even  improbable  in 
a  limited  use  of  Q  by  Mark.  The  objection 
to  an  extended  use  is  precisely  the  vivid 
power  of  most  of  the  book  which  bears  the 
stamp  of  Peter's  burning  story.  Chapter  13 
is  called  **  The  Little  Apocalypse "  and  may 
represent  another  source  used  by  Mark.  It 
may  have  been  a  written  source  (Swete, 
"  Commentary,"  p.  lix)  because  in  13  :  14  the 
words  **  Let  him  that  readeth  understand  "  ^ 
would  imply  that,  provided  they  belonged  to 
the  source.  We  know  from  Luke  1:1-4 
that  "  many "  undertook  to  tell  their  story 
about  various  aspects  of  the  words  and  deeds 
of  Jesus.  Mark  wrote  with  freedom  and  con- 
cern at  the  same  time  to  be  faithful  to  the 
data  in  hand.     Swete  properly  sums  up  the 

*  Cf.  Streeter,  "  St.  Mark's  Knowledge  and  Use  of  Q  " 
("  Oxford  Studies  in  the  Synoptic  Problem  "),  191 1,  pp. 
165-183.  ^  6  dvayivioafiutv  voeiTio, 


MAEK'S  WONDEOUS  GOSPEL      147 

matter  thus :  "  On  the  whole  it  seems  safe  to 
assume  as  a  working  theory  of  the  origina- 
tion of  the  Gospel  that  its  main  source  is 
the  teaching  of  St.  Peter,  which  has  supplied 
nearly  the  entire  series  of  notes  descriptive 
of  the  Galilean  Ministry,  and  has  largely  in- 
fluenced the  remainder  of  the  book"  (" Com- 
mentary," p.  lix). 

6.    The  Close  of  the  Gospel. 

It  seems  certain  that  Mark  did  not  close 
his  Gospel  as  we  have  it  in  our  New  Testa- 
ments. The  two  oldest  and  best  Greek  man- 
uscripts of  the  New  Testament  (Aleph  or 
Codex  Sinaiticus  and  B  or  Codex  Vaticanus) 
close  with  verse  8  of  chapter  i6  and  with  the 
words,  "for  they  were  afraid."  At  first  one 
has  a  shock  of  surprise  to  find  such  an  end- 
ing. Maclean  (Hastings'  Dictionary  of  Christ 
and  the  Gospels)  considers  it  "inconceiv- 
able" that  this  "abrupt  and  inauspicious" 
ending  can  be  the  way  that  Mark  closed  his 
book.  But  Farmer  (International  Standard 
Bible  Encyclopaedia)  thinks  that  "it  is  just 
possible  that  the  Gospel  did  end  at  verse  8. 
The  very  abruptness  would  argue  an  early 
date  when  Christians  lived  in  the  atmosphere 


148    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

of  the  Resurrection  and  would  form  an  even 
appropriate  closing  for  the  Gospel  of  the 
Servant."  So  the  doctors  disagree  very 
widely.  It  is  possible  that  Mark  did  not 
end  his  Gospel  here.  The  real  ending  may 
have  been  lost.  The  last  leaf  of  the  roll 
may  have  been  lost  very  early.  "I  regard 
it  nevertheless  as  one  of  the  possibilities  of 
future  finds  that  we  receive  this  Gospel  with 
its  own  authentic  finish.  Mark  has  been 
connected  with  Alexandria.  May  Grenfell 
and  Hunt  add  to  their  numerous  gifts  the 
close  of  the  original  Mark  from  an  Egyptian 
papyrus"  (Gregory,  "The  Canon  and  Text 
of  the  New  Testament,"  1907,  p.  512).  The 
present  long  ending  has  been  ascribed  to 
Ariston,  probably  the  Aristion  mentioned  in 
Papias,  by  an  Armenian  scribe  who  wrote 
in  between  verses  8  and  9  in  red  ink  the 
words  "  Ariston  Eredzou  "  (Ariston  the  Pres- 
byter). This  discovery  was  made  by  Mr.  F. 
C.  Conybeare.  "So  here  at  last  was  the 
missing  evidence  for  the  last  twelve  verses, 
and  a  discovery  for  critical  confirmation 
which  should  be  the  end  of  all  strife" 
(Rendel  Harris,  "Sidelights  on  New  Testa- 
ment Research,"  1908,  p.  92). 


MAEK'S  WONDEOUS  GOSPEL      149 

Several  Greek  manuscripts  (L  and  three 
other  uncials  and  four  cursives)  have  two 
endings,  the  usual  one  and  a  shorter  one, 
while  the  Old  Latin  K  has  only  the  short 
one.  It  reads  as  follows :  "  All  that  had 
been  commanded  to  them  they  briefly  re- 
ported to  Peter  and  his  company.  And 
after  this  Jesus  Himself  appeared  to  them 
and  from  the  east  even  unto  the  west  sent 
forth  by  them  the  holy  and  incorruptible 
proclamation  of  the  eternal  salvation."  No 
one  defends  this  ending  which  is  an  evident 
makeshift  to  supply  a  suitable  close  for  the 
Gospel  of  Mark. 

The  newly-discovered  Washington  Manu- 
script (W),  itself  as  old  as  Aleph  and  B  and 
kept  in  this  country,  has  an  expanded  end- 
ing. After  verse  14  of  the  usual  long  end- 
ing we  find  these  words:  *'And  they  de- 
fended themselves  saying  that  this  age  of 
lawlessness  and  sin  is  under  the  power  of 
Satan,  who,  through  unclean  spirits,  does 
not  suffer  the  true  virtue  of  God  to  be 
apprehended.  Therefore  now  reveal  Thy 
righteousness.  And  Christ  addressed  them 
and  said,  'The  limit  of  the  years  of  the 
authority  of  Satan  has  been  reached,   but 


150    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

other  dread  things  are  coming :  and  it  was 
for  those  who  had  sinned  that  I  was  delivered 
to  death  that  they  might  return  to  the  Truth 
and  sin  no  more,  but  inherit  the  spiritual  and 
immortal  glory  of  righteousness  in  heaven '  " 
(Rendel  Harris'  translation,  "Side-lights  on 
New  Testament  Research,"  p.  90^.^  Then  the 
usual  ending  proceeds.  These  various  end- 
ings throw  suspicion  upon  one  another  and 
we  can  only  say  that  we  do  not  now  know 
how  Mark  ended  his  Gospel.  Some  day  we 
may  know. 

7.     Characteristics  of  Mark's  Gospel. 

The  Gospel  of  Mark  did  not  at  first  rank 
as  high  as  the  other  Gospels.  Two  (Matthew 
and  John)  were  by  aposties  themselves,  while 
Mark  was  only  a  disciple  of  an  apostle. 
Luke's  Gospel  is  much  longer  and  has 
greater  literary  charm.  Mark's  is  the  briefest 
and  was  slighted  by  many.  The  earliest 
commentary  that  is  preserved  is  ascribed  to 
Victor  of  Antioch  (fifth  or  sixth  century)  who 
says  that  he  knew  of  none  on  Mark's  Gospel. 

*  Cf.  also  Cobern,  "  The  New  Archaeological  Discov- 
eries and  Their  Bearing  Upon  the  New  Testament," 
1917,  p.  164. 


MAEK^S  WONDEOUS  GOSPEL      151 

The  book  had  no  settled  place  in  the  manu- 
scripts, sometimes  coming  last  of  the  Four 
Gospels  as  in  the  Washington  Manuscript. 
The  early  writers  varied  greatly  in  the 
symbol  for  Mark,  using  each  of  the  four  for 
him  (lion,  man,  ox,  eagle).  But  all  this  is 
changed  now  and  the  merit  of  this  Gospel 
is  better  appreciated.  "  It  is  seen,  too,  to  be 
at  the  basis  of  the  whole  problem  of  the 
mutual  relations  of  the  canonical  Gospels, 
and  is  believed  by  many  to  take  us  nearest 
the  primitive  form  of  the  evangelical  nar- 
rative. So  it  has  become  the  subject  of  a 
quite  peculiar  interest,  and  engages  the 
sedulous  attention  of  students"  (Salmond, 
Hastings'  Dictionary  of  the  Bible). 

It  is  clear  that  Mark  wrote  out  his  recol- 
lections of  Peter's  preaching  con  amove. 
There  was  an  affinity  between  the  minds 
of  the  two  men.  Each  had  a  lively  style, 
direct,  simple,  objective,  picturesque,  telling, 
and  realistic.  No  doubt  Peter  had  influenced 
Mark's  style  unconsciously.  Both  Peter  and 
Mark  were  impulsive  and  warm-hearted. 
Each  made  mistakes  and  each  rallied  and 
did  his  real  work  afterwards.  Peter  denied 
his  Lord  (a  great  sin)  and  Mark  deserted 


152    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

his  leader  (a  great  blunder).  The  stamp  of 
Peter's  mind  is  upon  this  Gospel,  but  Mark's 
hand  is  in  it  also.  The  book  seems  like  a 
torso  without  beginning  or  proper  ending. 
It  is  a  mere  sketch,  but  it  has  a  powerful 
grasp  of  the  heart  of  Christ's  life.  It  is  a 
book  of  action  and  power,  but  the  words  of 
Jesus  are  not  neglected.  The  miracles  are 
more  prominent  than  the  parables,  but  the 
teaching  of  Jesus  is  in  evidence.  We  see 
Christ  the  Preacher  and  the  Teacher  in  Mark 
as  well  as  Christ  the  Healer  and  the  Saviour 
from  sin.  There  is  little  discussion  of  doc- 
trine, but  the  Cross  is  central  in  the  book 
and  the  Atonement  is  stated  in  the  words  of 
Jesus  who  came  "to  give  his  life  a  ransom 
for  many"  (10:45).  There  is  the  graphic 
style  of  an  eye-witness  with  the  sure  swift- 
ness of  a  cinema  machine.  Jesus  is  here 
drawn  to  the  life.  And  Jesus  is  the  center 
of  everything  in  this  book.  "  In  addition  to 
all  this  evidence  there  is  the  oft-recurring 
reference  to  the  lights  and  shadows  that 
passed  over  the  Face  of  Jesus  in  joy  and 
sorrow,  satisfaction  and  disappointment,  in- 
dignation and  anger  "  (Luckock,  "  The  Special 
Characteristics  of  the  Four  Gospels,"  1900, 


MAEK'S  WONDEOUS  GOSPEL      153 

P-  93)'  Peter  pictured  Christ  so  that  the 
picture  set  Mark's  mind  all  ablaze  with  in- 
terest and  enthusiasm.  Christian  artists  have 
painted  Peter  holding  a  book  and  Mark  a 
pen  or  Peter  preaching  while  Mark  is  taking 
notes.  That  is  an  exaggerated  portrayal  of 
Peter's  influence  on  Mark  who  certainly  re- 
tained his  own  individuality  in  the  work. 

It  is  often  said  that  John's  Gospel  sets 
forth  the  Deity  of  Christ^  while  the  Gospel 
of  Mark  presents  His  Humanity.^  That  is 
true  in  a  general  way,  but  the  Humanity  of 
Jesus  is  in  the  Gospel  of  John  and  the  Deity 
of  Jesus  in  the  Gospel  of  Mark.  It  is  there 
by  implication  and  by  statement.  Pfleiderer 
sees  this  clearly.  "This  oldest  Evangelist 
furnishes  the  truest  impression  which  Jesus 
made  on  His  environment, — here  He  actually 
lives  and  works"  ("Christian  Origins,"  p.  219). 
And  yet  Pfleiderer  has  to  add:  "He  wrote 
for  Heathen-Christians  and  wished  to  awaken 
or  confirm  the  conviction  that,  despite  the 
rejection  by  the  Jews,  Jesus  of  Nazareth  was 


*  Cf.  my  "  Divinity  of  Christ  in  the  Gospel  of  John  " 
(1916). 

'Cf.  "The  Humanity  of  Jesus  Christ"  (pp.  105- 
1 14  of  Luckock*s  '*  Characteristics  of  the  Four  Gospels  ")• 


154    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

proven  to  be  the  Christ  and  the  Son  of  God 
by  wonders  and  signs  of  every  kind."  That 
is  true,  little  as  Pfleiderer  likes  it.  The  Christ 
of  Mark's  Gospel  is  in  reality  the  Christ  of 
Peter,  of  John,  of  Matthew,  of  Luke,  of  Paul, 
of  them  all,  Son  of  God  and  Son  of  man, 
Lord  and  Saviour  of  men. 

Mark's  Gospel  is  consummate  art  after  all 
without  meaning  to  be  art  at  all,  "a  work 
wherein  the  artist  is  more  completely  effaced 
by  his  subject"  (Von  Soden,  "Early  Chris- 
tian Literature,"  tr.  1906,  p.  153).  One  never 
thinks  of  Mark  in  reading  his  Gospel,  but 
one  sees  Jesus,  hears  Him,  loves  Him,  fol- 
lows Him,  worships  Him. 


X 

WINNING  PAUL'S  PRAISE 

"  And  Mark,  the  cousin  of  Barnabas  {touching  whom 
ye  received  commandtnent ;  if  he  come  unto  you, 
receive  him).' '—Cou  4:  lo. 

"  Take  Mark,  and  bring  him  with  thee  ;  for  he  is 
useful  to  me  for  ministering,'' — 2  Tim.  4  :  ii. 


X 

WINNING  PAUL'S  PRAISE 

I.     Co- Worker  With  Paul  in  Rome, 

TIME  heals  many  sores,  time  and 
work  and  the  grace  of  God.  Some 
fifteen  years  have  passed  since  Mark 
deserted  Paul  at  Perga  and  ten  or  a  dozen 
since  the  fatal  breach  at  Antioch  between 
Paul  and  Barnabas  over  Mark  (Acts  15  139). 
Paul  has  evidently  watched  the  career  of 
Mark  with  genuine  interest  and  is  now  glad 
to  see  that  he  was  mistaken  in  his  opinion  of 
the  essential  fickleness  of  Mark's  character. 
Mark  has  proven  by  his  work  with  Barnabas 
and  with  Peter  that  the  root  of  the  matter  is 
in  him.  The  result  is  that  he  has  wholly  re- 
covered Paul's  good  opinion.  Barnabas  and 
Peter  have  had  him  in  tow  and  they  have 
done  their  work  well.  It  used  to  be  the 
fashion  for  old  preachers  to  take  young 
preachers  through  a  course  of  "swamp 
theology"  and  practical  experience.  The. 
157 


158    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

young  preacher  would  read  theology  with 
a  master  just  as  a  young  lawyer  would  read 
law  under  a  great  jurist  and  a  young  physi- 
cian would  read  medicine  with  a  great 
practitioner.  There  were  some  advantages 
in  such  a  practical  and  personal  clinic,  but  it 
takes  a  great  deal  of  time  and  may  be  a 
rather  narrow  and  one  sided  discipline. 
Schools  do  better  on  the  whole  for  most  men 
and  yet  it  must  be  admitted  that  Mark  re- 
flects credit  on  his  teachers  in  the  end  of  the 
day.  It  is  possible  that  Peter  is  also  in 
Rome  at  this  time  with  Paul  and  Mark, 
though  the  probability  is  rather  against  it 
since  he  could  hardly  be  omitted  from  the 
list  of  Paul's  Jewish  co-workers  in  Rome,  for 
he  says  "these  only"  in  Colossians  4:11. 
Probably  Peter  left  Rome  before  Paul  came 
and  Mark  remained.  It  is  generally  thought 
that  Barnabas  was  now  dead,  since  Mark  is 
with  Paul.  But  this  is  a  "  somewhat  pre- 
carious "  argument  (Lightfoot,  Col.  tn  loco), 
Paul  is  affectionate  in  his  reference  to  Barna- 
bas here  and  in  i  Corinthians  9 : 6.  There  was 
no  sting  left  by  the  clash  at  Antioch  in 
Galatians  2  : 1 1  fi.  and  the  subsequent  separa- 
tion (Acts  15:39).     Great  souls  can  forgive 


WINKING  PAUL'S  PRAISE         159 

a  wrong  and  drop  a  quarrel  even  if  they  do 
not  literally  forget  the  episode.  They  do  not 
cherish  it.     They  let  bygones  be  bygones. 

It  is  good  to  see  Mark  with  Paul  once 
more.  Surely  Mark  felt  grateful  at  this 
clinching  evidence  that  Paul  now  looked 
with  affection  and  satisfaction  upon  the 
young  man  who  went  not  to  the  work  (Acts 
15:38).  He  was  no  longer  "Mark  the 
Apostate  "  as  Paul  had  branded  him  with  a 
word  that  burned  through  the  years.  He  is 
actually  one  of  Paul's  *'  co-workers  "  or  **  fel- 
low-workers* unto  the  Kingdom  of  God." 
He  is  no  longer  a  mere  **  attendant "  doing 
personal  service,  but  is  ranked  with  the  best 
and  most  faithful  of  Paul's  helpers  in  Rome. 
Paul  notes  a  group  of  these  Jewish  Christians 
in  Rome  who  are  loyal  to  him  (Aristarchus, 
Mark,  Jesus  Justus)  and  "  these  only."  ^  We 
know  from  Philippians  i :  15-18  that  some 
of  the  Jewish  Christians  in  Rome  took  pleas- 
ure in  annoying  Paul  out  of  envy  and  strife, 
probably  Judaizers  who  have  come  on  to 
Rome.^    Paul's  language  here  need  not  be 

*  ffovipyoi  el?  Tijv  ^affiXetav  zoo  Oeou, 

'  OVTOl  fXOIiOl, 

*Cf.  Lightfoot,  Philippians,  in  loco» 


160    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

pressed  too  literally,  but  certainly  it  means 
that  among  the  prominent  Jewish  Christians 
in  Rome  Paul  can  name  these  three  alone  as 
men  on  whom  he  can  count  in  the  present 
emergency  (Li ghtfoot,  in  loco).  In  Philippians 
2 :  2of.  Paul  again  notes  how  all  except 
Timothy  **  seek  their  own,  not  the  things  of 
Christ."  Mark  now  has  an  honorable  place 
in  this  small  list  of  Pauline  loyalists.  He 
is  no  longer  a  deserter,  but  one  to  be 
trusted. 

These  are  "  men  that  have  been  a  comfort 
unto  me" ^  (Col.  4:11).  The  word  here  for 
"comfort"  occurs  nowhere  else  in  the  New 
Testament.  The  range  of  meaning  is  wider 
than  the  commoner  words,  but  the  medical 
use  for  assuaging  or  alleviating  pain  comes 
to  be  the  predominant  one.  Once  Mark  be- 
cause of  his  defection  was  a  spiritual  irritant 
to  Paul  and  it  was  disturbing  to  have  him 
with  him.  Now  his  presence  is  soothing  and 
cheering  to  Paul  the  prisoner.  Clearly  Mark 
is  taking  pains  to  be  pleasing  and  helpful  to 
Paul  and  he  has  succeeded.  There  is  a  won- 
derful difTerence  in  people  about  this  matter 

*  oiriv£<i  £^£vrjd7}(Tdv  fjLOt  Ttaprjyopia.  The  technical 
use  o{  TzapTiYopia  is  medical  (our  paregoric). 


WINNING  PAUI/S  PEAISE         161 

of  consolation.  It  pays  the  pastor  to  study 
calmness  and  gentleness  of  manner  so  that 
his  presence  may  leave  the  sick  better  and 
not  worse.  It  does  make  a  difference  whether 
the  fur  is  rubbed  the  wrong  way.  Probably 
Paul  made  a  point  of  letting  Mark  know  that 
he  acknowledged  his  error  of  judgment  about 
him  and  expressed  pleasure  in  his  achieve- 
ments. Kind  words  cost  little,  but  they  go 
far  toward  smoothing  the  path  of  weary 
toilers  who  have  many  unknown  causes  for 
annoyance. 

But  the  crowning  word  of  praise  from  Paul 
occurs  in  2  Tim.  4:11  where  he  says  of  Mark : 
"  for  he  is  useful  to  me  for  ministering."  * 
Once  Mark  was  useless  to  Paul  and  he  stoutly 
refused  to  take  him  along  with  him  on  the 
second  mission  tour  because  of  his  failure  in 
the  first.  Now  Paul  explains  to  Timothy 
why  he  wants  him  and  puts  the  verb  first  as 
if  to  say :  "  He  is  useful  to  me."  He  has 
made  good  with  Paul  in  great  style  right 
where  he  was  weak.  Surely  Timothy  told 
Mark  these  words  of  Paul,  words  that  would 
warm  the  cockles  of  his  heart  and  make  him 

^  eariv  yap  fioi  eu^pi^ffTog  e??  dtafzoviav.  The  position 
and  accent  of  eariv  emphasizes  the  point. 


162    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

happy.  The  reason  for  mentioning  this  pas- 
sage here  is  that  Paul  is  manifestly  alluding 
to  what  Mark  did  for  him  before  the  second 
Roman  imprisonment.  It  is  a  backward 
glance  at  Mark's  previous  service  to  Paul. 
The  allusion  seems  to  be  to  the  time  of  Co- 
lossians  4 :  10,  when  Mark  was  with  Paul  in 
Rome.  We  do  not  know  to  what  Paul  re- 
fers by  the  general  expression  "useful  for 
ministering."  White  suggests  that,  since 
Mark  was  Peter's  interpreter  of  Aramaic  into 
Greek,  so  here  he  is  Paul's  interpreter  of 
Greek  into  Latin  (Expositor's  Greek  Testa- 
ment, in  loco).  This  is,  of  course,  possible. 
Paul  probably  knew  Latin,  but  may  not  have 
been  fluent  in  it  and  he  may  have  had  some 
need  for  Latin  converse  in  his  dealings  with 
the  Praetorian  Guard  (Phil,  i  :  13)  or  with 
Caesar's  household  (Phil.  4:22).  Others  have 
suggested  that  Paul  read  Mark's  Gospel  while 
in  Rome  and  that  it  may  have  been  included 
in  Paul's  list  of  books  that  he  left  at  Troas 
(2  Tim.  4 :  13).  This  also  is  quite  possible. 
Some  critics  imagine  that  they  can  detect  a 
Pauline  influence  in  Mark's  Gospel.  Paul 
may  have  acknowledged  a  contribution  from 
Mark  to  his  own  intellectual  and  spiritual  life. 


WINNING  PAUL'S  PEAISE         163 

Whatever  the  service  was  Paul  sincerely  ap- 
preciated it  and  confessed  himself  debtor  to 
Mark  his  co-worker,  comfort,  and  helper. 
Praise  like  this  from  Paul  would  compensate 
Mark  for  much  that  he  had  suffered  and  was 
rich  reward  for  the  years  of  sincere  endeavor 
to  make  his  life  tell  for  Christ. 

2.    Commended  by  Paul  to  the  Colossians. 

Mark  apparently  means  to  make  a  visit  to 
Colossae,  for  Paul  says:  '^If  he  come  unto 
you,  receive  him  "  (Col.  4  :  10).  He  may  have 
had  an  engagement  with  Peter  in  this  region. 
It  seems  likely  that  this  visit  was  made,  for 
Mark  sends  a  salutation  to  the  saints  of  Asia 
and  the  other  Roman  provinces  when  Peter 
writes  to  them  (i  Pet.  5  :  13).  It  is  probable 
that  Paul's  former  poor  opinion  of  Mark  had 
spread  over  a  wide  area  since  he  took  so  much 
trouble  now  to  correct  it  (Maclean,  Hastings' 
Dictionary  of  Christ  and  the  Gospels).  "  The 
Pauline  churches,  which  were  aware  of  the 
estrangement,  might  not  be  very  ready  to  give 
a  hearty  welcome  to  Mark  *'  (Gould,  '*  Inter- 
national Critical  Commentary,"  in  loco).  Paul 
is  evidently  anxious  to  remove  any  remaining 
prejudice  against  Mark  so  that  he  may  be 


164    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

able  to  do  well  what  he  has  to  perform.  Paul 
had  written  the  Colossians  before  on  the  sub- 
ject of  Mark's  reception,  "  touching  whom  ye 
received  commandments  *'  ^  (Col.  4  :  10).  The 
"commandments'*  in  question  could  have 
been  sent  by  word  of  mouth  or  by  letter.  If 
not  by  letter,  Lightfoot  suggests  Peter  or 
Barnabas  as  the  bearer  of  Paul's  message 
about  Mark.  One  of  the  "  commandments  " 
Paul  repeats :  **  If  he  come  unto  you,  receive  ^ 
him."  The  word  "receive"  was  the  usual 
term  for  hospitable  welcome.^  Paul  is  now 
willing  to  underwrite  Mark  before  he  comes 
to  Colossae.  It  is  not  a  case  of  Paul's  being 
anxious  to  get  rid  of  Mark.  People  some- 
times write  the  most  enthusiastic  letters  of 
commendation  of  those  whom  they  wish  to 
palm  off  upon  somebody  else.  Paul  is  not 
trying  to  victimize  the  Colossians.  It  is  now 
precisely  because  he  has  found  Mark  **  use- 
ful "  and  '*  a  comfort "  that  he  is  so  glad  to 
speak  a  good  word  about  him  to  the  church 
in  Colossae.     That  is  a  useful  and  a  kind 


^7:cp}    00    iXd/^sre    ivroXd's,     The  epistolary  aorist  is 
ruled  out  here  (Lightfoot). 

^In  Luke  10:  38  we  have  MdpOa  or.edi^aro  avTov, 


WIiroraG  PAUL'S  PEAISE         165 

thing  to  do.  Peripatetic  preachers  have  been 
known  to  take  advantage  of  such  particular 
commendation.  One  should  be  sure  of  his 
man  before  he  gives  him  a  carte  blanche  letter 
of  endorsement.  Paul  cared  little  for  such 
matters  and  ridiculed  the  Judaizers  who  went 
to  Corinth  with  genuine  or  spurious  letters  of 
recommendation  to  influence  the  brethren : 
"  Or  need  we,  as  do  some,  epistles  of  com- 
mendation to  you  or  from  you  "  (2  Cor.  3:1). 
Paul  is  not  giving  this  note  of  commendation 
to  Mark,  but  to  the  Colossians  about  him. 
It  is  certain  that,  when  Mark  came  to  Colos- 
sae,  he  found  a  kindly  spirit  toward  him.  Paul 
knew  what  it  was  to  have  a  man  like  Barnabas 
stand  voucher  for  him  when  he  was  under 
suspicion. 

3.    In  His  Old  Haunts  in  the  East. 

We  know  that  Mark  went  east  again,  be- 
cause in  2  Timothy  4:11  Paul  urges  Tim- 
othy, when  in  Ephesus,  to  "  take  ^  Mark,  and 
bring  him."  "It  is  implied  that  Mark  was 
somewhere  on  the  line  of  route  between 
Ephesus  and  Rome,  but  we  do  not  know 

^  dvaXa^cDv.  Vulgate  assume.  Cf.  also  Acts  20:  13, 
14;  23:31.  They  "picked  up  Paul  "  at  Assos.  In 
23  :  3 1  wc  have  dvaXa^ovzsg  ^yayov  as  here  (aye). 


166    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTRY 

the  precise  place  '*  (White,  Expositor's  Greek 
Testament,  in  loco).  It  was  probably  at  Co- 
lossse  or  Miletus.  Mark  was  now  an  expert 
workman  and  no  novice.  He  no  longer  had 
need  to  be  ashamed  of  his  work  nor  was  Paul 
ashamed  of  it  (2  Tim.  2:15).  The  rather 
Paul  was  now  proud  of  his  old  protege.  It 
is  amazing  how  much  a  young  preacher 
can  develop  with  the  years.  "Be  diligent 
in  these  things ;  give  thyself  wholly  to  them ; 
that  thy  progress  ^  may  be  manifest  unto  all " 
(i  Tim.  4:15).  Mark  had  now  forged  his 
way  to  the  front  so  that  all  men  could  see. 
He  had  very  distinctly  "arrived."  Once  a 
young  preacher,  just  starting  to  college,  in- 
nocently enough  impressed  a  deacon  that  he 
was  too  "fast"  for  a  preacher  because  he 
rode  a  plow-horse  all  sorts  of  gaits.  The 
deacon  was  very  positive  in  his  judgment 
and  free  with  his  criticism.  Years  later  he 
wrote  to  the  preacher  a  letter  of  apology, 
but  added  that  no  young  preacher  ought 
ever  to  be  discouraged  since  God  had  done 
what  he  had  with  this  victim  of  the  deacon's 
prejudice.  He  was  entirely  right.  No  man 
should  be  disheartened  by  difficulties  or  by 
*  npokoTZTJ  cutting  ahead. 


WINNING  PAUL'S  PEAISE         167 

adverse  criticism.  It  is  far  better  to  sur- 
mount the  obstacles  and  to  turn  them  to 
glorious  gain.  Mark  is  now  out  from  under 
the  cloud  of  reproach.  He  had  long  ago 
*' vindicated  and  justified  the  risk  Barnabas 
had  run  in  giving  him  a  chance  of  recover- 
ing his  character  "  (White,  Expositor's  Greek 
Testament,  in  loco), 

4.    Longed  for  by  the  Lonely  Paul. 

Paul  had  once  scouted  the  proposal  of  Bar- 
nabas to  "  take  along  "  John  Mark.  But  now 
he  hungers  for  the  comfort  of  his  presence. 
During  his  former  imprisonment  in  Rome 
Paul  had  learned  to  lean  on  Mark  as  a  re- 
liable staff.  Now  he  is  in  prison  again  with 
no  liberties  and  fewer  friends.  He  has  no 
hired  house  to  which  they  can  come.  He  is 
probably  in  the  dread  Mamertine  dungeon 
and  few,  like  Onesiphorus,  have  the  courage 
to  make  diligent  search  to  find  the  old  Lion 
of  Liberty  and  to  face  death  for  his  sake 
(2  Tim.  1:17).  One  by  one  Paul's  co-workers 
left  him  on  one  pretext  or  another.  "  Demas 
forsook  me,  having  loved  this  present  world, 
and  went  to  Thessalonica ;  Crescens  to  Ga- 
latia,  Titus  to  Dalmatia  "  (2  Tim.  4 :  10).     So 


168    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

the  melancholy  record  runs.  It  is  like  a 
wholesale  Perga,  only  they  all  gave  "the 
work "  as  the  reason  for  leaving  Paul  to  his 
fate  which  all  foresaw.  It  is  pathetic  beyond 
words  as  the  aged  prisoner  goes  on  to  add 
in  his  cold  and  dreariness:  "Only  Luke  is 
with  me."  Blessings  on  this  "  beloved  physi- 
cian** who  is  not  afraid  of  death  and  who 
risks  his  own  life  for  the  sake  of  his  great 
friend.  This  is  one  of  the  great  friendships 
of  history,  that  between  Paul  and  Luke.  It 
is  fitting  for  the  preacher  and  the  physician 
^  to  be  fast  friends.  They  both  deal  with  the 
realities  of  life  and  see  people  in  their  hours 
of  weakness  and  of  need.  They  ought  to 
work  together  in  harmony.  The  physician 
ought  to  be  a  Christian.  It  is  a  pity  to  see 
the  preacher  the  tool  of  a  quack.  Paul  and 
Luke  were  both  men  of  genius,  of  culture,  of 
passion  for  Christ  and  for  humanity.  But, 
much  as  Luke  is  to  Paul,  his  heart  goes  out 
after  two  young  preachers  who  have  meant 
much  to  him.  He  wants  them  to  be  by  his 
side  when  the  end  comes,  as  he  knows  it  will 
come  soon.  One  of  these  is  Timothy,  of 
course.  It  seems  that  Timothy  did  come  and 
was  put  in  prison  for  his  courageous  stand 


WINlJfING  PAUL'S  PEAISE         169 

by  Paul.  In  Hebrews  13 :  23  we  read :  **  Know 
ye  that  our  brother  Timothy  hath  been  set  at 
liberty.'*  The  other  young  preacher,  young 
in  comparison  with  "  Paul  the  aged,"  is  Mark. 
"  Take  Mark,  and  bring  him  with  thee ;  for 
he  is  useful  to  me  for  ministering."  As  the 
shadows  close  round  us,  we  wish  only  real 
friends  about  us,  real  friends  and  real  books. 
So  Sir  Walter  Scott  died  with  his  loved  ones 
about  him  who  brought  him  **The  Book," 
the  only  Book  to  live  by  and  to  die  by. 
Paul  longs  for  Timothy  and  Mark  and  his 
"cloak"  and  **the  books,  especially  the 
parchments."  Precious  books  were  these, 
perhaps  with  marginal  comments  by  Paul. 
Some  of  them  were  probably  parts  of  the 
Old  Testament  in  Hebrew  or  in  Greek.  One 
of  them  may  have  been  Luke's  Gospel,  an- 
other the  Acts,  another  may  have  been 
Mark's  Gospel.  Paul  means  to  keep  up 
his  "ministry"  to  the  end.  "But  I  hold 
not  my  life  of  any  account  as  dear  unto 
myself,  so  that  I  may  accomplish  my  course, 
and  the  ministry  which  I  received  from  the 
Lord  Jesus,  to  testify  the  gospel  of  the  grace 
of  God"  (Acts  20:24).  So  Paul  spoke  to 
the  elders  of  Ephesus  at  Miletus  nearly  a 


170    MAKING  GOOD  IN  THE  MINISTEY 

dozen  years  before.  His  ministry  is  near  its 
close,  but  he  will  keep  on  to  the  very  end. 
So  he  wants  Mark  "  for  ministering."  Mark 
had  shown  a  genius  for  helping  great  men 
and  now  the  last  wish  of  Paul  is  that  Mark 
may  be  at  his  side  to  help  him  make  the  last 
days  full  of  service  for  Christ.  We  may  be 
sure  that  Mark  came  if  it  lay  in  his  power  to 
do  so.  We  may  think,  therefore,  of  Luke, 
Timothy  and  Mark,  together  with  some  of 
the  brave  spirits  in  Rome,  as  the  faithful 
band  that  saw  the  greatest  preacher  of  the 
ages  pay  the  price  of  loyalty  to  Jesus  Christ 
with  his  own  life. 

This  is  a  good  place  to  leave  Mark.  Here 
we  must  leave  him,  for  our  sources  of  infor- 
mation all  fail  us.  Mark  kept  to  the  path  of 
service  to  the  end,  we  may  be  sure.  He  was 
not  a  genius  on  the  scale  of  Paul  or  of  John. 
He  apparendy  lacked  the  gifts  of  oratory 
possessed  by  Barnabas  and  Peter.  But  he 
learned  to  make  himself  useful  to  others  and 
to  make  the  most  of  the  talents  that  he  had. 
He  became  "a  good  minister  of  Christ 
Jesus  "  (i  Tim.  4 : 6).  That  is  a  nobler  achieve- 
ment than  merely  spectacular  gifts  that  are 
not  wisely  used.     That  goal  is  possible  to  us 


WINNING  PAUL'S  PRAISE         171 

all  Mark  should  be  an  inspiration  to  the 
average  minister  who  has  to  toil  in  obscure 
places  and  unrecognized  by  the  great  major- 
ity and  who  makes  mistakes  that  dishearten 
him.  It  is  all  a  part  of  the  day's  work. 
Preachers  are  made  out  of  men,  out  of  the 
same  human  stuff  that  other  people  have. 
Preachers  are  made  out  of  laymen.  Give  us 
better  laymen  and  we  shall  have  better 
preachers.  But  preachers  are  entitled  to 
more  than  one  chance.  We  should  magnify 
our  office  and  magnify  Christ.  In  the  end 
what  matters  most  is  that  we  did  an  honest 
day's  work.  People  have  their  tastes  about 
preaching  as  about  everything  else.  In 
Scotland,  that  land  of  good  preaching,  there 
are  **  sermon-tasters "  who  know  how  to 
sample  sermons  by  the  smack  of  the  words. 
We  know  very  little  after  all  about  the  re- 
spective merits  of  preachers.  "Wherefore 
judge  nothing  before  the  time,  until  the  Lord 
come,  who  will  bring  to  light  the  hidden 
things  of  darkness,  and  make  manifest  the 
counsels  of  the  heart ;  and  then  shall  each 
man  have  his  praise  from  God  "  (i  Cor.  4:5). 
And  Mark  now  has  **  the  praise  "  from  God 
which  is  better  even  than  that  from  Paul. 


Special  Books  on  Mark  and 
His  Gospel 

(Apart  from  coniinuous  commentaries  by  the 
same  author,  books  on  all  the  Gospels,  the 
Synoptic  problem,  Cyclopcedia  articles.) 

Abbott,  E.  A.,  The  Fourfold  Gospel  (Diatessarica, 
Sections  III,  IV,  V,  1915,  191 6,  191 7.  These 
three  volumes  are  devoted  to  Mark). 

Alexander,  Gospel  according  to  St.  Mark.     1863. 

Allen,  The  Gospel  according  to  Mark.     1915. 

Bacon,  The  Beginnings  of  Gospel  Story  :  A  Historico- 
Critical  Inquiry  into  the  Sources  of  and  Struc- 
ture of  the  Gospel  according  to  Mark.     1909. 

Badham,  St.  Mark's  Indebtedness  to  St.  Matthew. 
1897. 

Bennett,  The  Life  of  Christ  according  to  St.  Mark. 
1907. 

Broadus,  The  Gospel  according  to  Mark.     1900. 

Bruce,  Gospel  according  to  St.  Mark.  The  Expos- 
itor's Greek  Testament.     1897. 

Burkitt,  The  Earliest  Sources  for  the  Life  of  Jesus. 
1910. 

Chad  wick.  The  Gospel  of  Mark.  The  Expositor's 
Bible.     1887. 

Clarke,  The  Gospel  of  Mark.  American  Commentary. 
1881. 

Du  Boisson,  The  Origin  and  Characteristics  of  Mark. 
1906. 

172 


BOOKS  ON  MAEK  AND  HIS  GOSPEL  173 

Goguel,  L'6vangile  de  Marc  et  ses  rapports  avec  ceux 
de  Matthieu  et  de  Luc.     1909. 

Hoffmann,  Das  Marcusevangelium  und  seine  Quellen. 
1904. 

Holtzmann,  Die  Synoptiker.  Hand-Commentar. 
1 90 1. 

Hunter,  John  Mark  or  the  Making  of  a  Saint.     191 7. 

Jacobus,  The  Gospel  according  to  Mark.  The  Bible 
for  Home  and  School.     1915. 

Klostermann,  Marcus.  Lietzmann's  Handbuch  zum 
Neuen  Testament.     1907. 

Lagrange,  fivangile  selon  St.  Marc.     191 1. 

Lindsay,  Mark's  Gospel.  T.  &  T.  Clark^s  Hand- 
books.    1883. 

Luckock,  Footprints  of  the  Son  of  Man  as  Traced  by 

St.  Mark.     1889. 
Maclear,  The  Gospel  of  St.  Mark.     Cambridge  Bible 

for  Schools  and  Colleges.     1893. 
Menzies,  The  Earliest  Gospel :  A  Historical  Study  of 

the  Gospel  according  to  St.  Mark.     1901. 

Morison,  Practical  Commentary  on  the  Gospel  accord- 
ing to  St.  Mark.     7th  edition.     1894. 

Plummer,  The  Gospel  according  to  St.  Mark.  Cam- 
bridge Greek  Testament.     191 5. 

Plummer,  The  Gospel  according  to  St.  Mark.  Cam- 
bridge Bible  for  Schools  and  Colleges.     191 5. 

Salmond,  The  Gospel  according  to  St.  Mark.  New 
Century  Bible. 

Swete,  The  Gospel  according  to  St.  Mark.  Second 
edition.     1902. 

Taylor,  The  Gospel  according  to  St.  Mark.  S.  B. 
Convention  Series. 

Weiss,  B.,  Das  Marcusevangelium.  Meyer-Kom- 
mentar.     1901. 


174  BOOKS  ON  MARK  AND  HIS  GOSPEL 

Weiss,    B.,   Die    Geschichtlichkeit  des   Marcusevan- 

geliums.     1905. 
Weiss,   B.,    Das   Marcusevangelium   und   seine  syn- 

optischen  Parallelen.      1872. 
Weiss,  J.,  Das  alteste  Evangeliura.     1903. 
Wellhausen,  Das  Evangelium  Marci.    Second  edition. 

1909. 
Wendling,  Urmarkus.     1905. 
Wendling,  Die  Entstehung  des  Marcusevangeliums. 

1908. 
Wohlenberg,  Das  Evangelium   des   Marcus.      Zahn 

Kommentar.     1 9 1  o. 


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Date  Due 


Mr  I  a  '40 


BS2475  .R64 

Making  good  in  the  ministry;  a  sketch  of 
Princeton  Theological  Seminary-Speer  Library 


1    1012  00013  4330      1111 


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